By the time of the Carnation Revolution that overthrew the dictatorial regime in 1974, Ana Gomes had been suspended from the Faculty of Law for "subversive activities"; she had been briefly arrested as an agitator, along with a group of fellow students, in December 1973 and was suspended the following month. At around this time, she was first employed part-time as a waitress at the restaurant Caldeiro owned by a popular actress of the time, Maria José Curado Ribeiro (she worked there alongside Rita Ribeiro and Guida Maria), and then as a translator for the exports department of the "Companhia Portuguesa de Congelação" (Portuguese Frozen Foods Company). She was present at the Largo do Carmo in the afternoon of the day of the revolution, 25 April 1974, when the forces of the Armed Forces Movement led by Salgueiro Maia and a crowd of civilian supporters besieged the headquarters of the National Republican Guard, where Prime Minister Marcelo Caetano had sought refuge, demanding he cede power. She later went to the Fort of Caxias to witness the release of the political prisoners. She was preparing to marry a fellow law student and political activist, António Monteiro Cardoso, just as the revolution took place, but the marriage had to be postponed to the following month.