THE FOREIGN SERVICE JOURNAL | JANUARY-FEBRUARY 2026 23 her beyond her comfort zone—and she remained connected to the campus and its students throughout her career, returning often to speak and participate in various programs. Amb. Thomas-Greenfield is the recipient of the Secretary’s Distinguished Service Award and other State Department honors. She is married to Lafayette Greenfield, a retired Foreign Service specialist, and the couple has two grown children, daughter Lindsay (a former Foreign Service specialist) and son Lafayette, known as “Deuce” (an attorney), and three grandchildren, Lydia, Luca, and Lola. Following are the ambassador’s responses to our questions. —Editor in Chief Shawn Dorman Foreign Service Journal: Congratulations on being the 2025 recipient of AFSA’s Award for Lifetime Contributions to American Diplomacy. This is so well deserved. Your remarks at the ceremony on October 1 were inspiring. Could you start us off here by saying a bit about what this award means to you personally and professionally? Ambassador Linda Thomas-Greenfield: Thank you so much. I was so honored to receive this award. For me, it was an affirmation of all the work that I have done over my entire 40-year career in the Foreign Service. It was also a recognition that to succeed in the Foreign Service, you don’t have to have a “normal” career, one that checks all the boxes to get to the top, because I did not check the boxes: I did work that was very people-centric. I did work that supported refugees. I did humanitarian work. I was told over and over and over again, every single time I took a position working on refugees, that I would not get promoted and that my career would be finished. Receiving this award affirms for me that the directions I took were the right directions for me. FSJ: What was it like joining the Foreign Service in the early 1980s as a Black woman in a still largely white male institution like the State Department? Did you feel supported or isolated, and were there peers or mentors who helped you navigate in those early years? Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs Linda Thomas-Greenfield speaks with an official from the Independent National Electoral Commission as voters wait to be registered at the Abuja Federal Capital Territory Area 1 polling center in Nigeria on March 28, 2015. U.S. DEPARTMENT OF STATE/IDIKA ONYUKWU
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