Thomas Dougherty is the Executive Director of the Australian-American Fulbright Commission, based in Canberra, Australia.

Ambassador Dougherty retired from the State Department in July 2016 after a 27-year career. He served as Ambassador in Burkina Faso from 2010-2013, and then as Deputy Chief of Mission in Australia from 2013-2016. He was Minister-Counselor for Public Affairs in Baghdad, and served in the Bureau of African Affairs as Office Director for West Africa and then as acting Deputy Assistant Secretary. He was Deputy Chief of Mission in Kinshasa from 2004-2007 and in Lilongwe from 2001-2004. His overseas assignments as a public affairs officer with USIA and then State were in Yaoundé, Bonn, Asmara, Brazzaville, Jeddah, and Dakar. He is the recipient of multiple State Department awards and speaks French, German, Italian, and some Arabic.

Ambassador Dougherty entered the Foreign Service after working as a dean and teacher in international schools in Belgium and in Switzerland, and as an editor and translator in Germany. His undergraduate degree from Brown University was followed by graduate work in California and at the Università per Stranieri in Perugia, Italy. He received a Fulbright grant for study in Indonesia, and a National Endowment for the Humanities fellowship to study the works of George Kennan.