“I said many years ago that I would love to serve at the federal level, but you have to know when the time is right,” Adams said. “I didn’t want to do it so bad that I was going to come out here and run against someone I thought was doing a good job. You have to believe that it is the right time for you.”

Her time came when Mel Watt resigned from the 12th District seat to be the director of the Federal Housing Finance Agency. His resignation was effective Jan. 6, yet his congressional seat sat vacant until Adams won the special election on Nov. 4. That’s also the day she also won her own seat in the U.S. House.

“It was two elections at the same time. That made it challenging,” she said. “It was a little confusing for voters. We were reminding people ‘I need you to vote twice for me and it will be legal,” she said with a laugh.

Adams was sworn in as the 100th woman in the 113th Congress on Nov. 12 to complete the final weeks of the term vacated by Watt. Winning the general election race means she gets her own two-year term. It was a little bittersweet for Adams as she got to Congress a few months ahead of her freshman class, but she says a disservice was done to her constituents.

“For 10 months we had no representation in Congress,” she said. “That’s why I said Day 1, we have to get our offices open, people have been denied representation for 10 months and that ends today.”

Two days after being sworn in to the U.S. House, Adams and her team worked vigorously to get her offices in the district open so constituents who have been waiting for months to voice their concerns were able to do so immediately.

“I want people to feel they are a part of this district – that is important to me,” she said. “Even those people who didn’t vote for me, I still represent them and we want everyone to have access.”

Gov. Pat McCrory had the option of calling a special election earlier than November but declined to do so. Adams said it was too long for the constituents to go without representation.

“We’re talking about a relatively poor district and majority minority. If this seat belonged to a person of another party, I just don’t think it would have gone that way,” she said.

After a month in Washington, D.C., Adams is ready to go to work for her constituents. She has been learning the lay of the land, attending committee meetings, voting and trying to get to know her fellow legislators.

Finishing up her predecessor’s term isn’t exactly new to Adams; that’s how she began in the N.C. General Assembly in 1994. Herman Gist died in office, leaving an unexpired term. Then-Gov. Jim Hunt appointed her to Gist’s seat.

While she will be working from the nation’s capital, she realizes that she has to do a lot of work across the district she represents. The district comprises portions of Cabarrus, Davidson, Forsyth, Guilford, Mecklenburg and Rowan counties. With a lot of area to cover, staying in touch is key.

“We’ve always had two major district offices, and they have been in Greensboro and Charlotte. We’re looking at doing satellite offices in some of the other areas like Winston Salem and Lexington,” she said. “Those satellite offices won’t be open full time but we will provide the designated times and days so people will know when they can come and be heard.”

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