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A federal immigration judge has granted asylum to a woman orphaned in Iran in the 1970s<\/a> and adopted by an American war veteran, who immigration officials threatened earlier this year with deportation to the country with which the U.S. is now at war<\/a>. <\/p>\n Judge Andrew Fishkin\u2019s ruling likely ends a monthslong ordeal for the California woman, one of thousands adopted from abroad who were never granted citizenship because of bureaucratic loopholes between adoption and immigration law.<\/p>\n The woman has lived in the United States since she was adopted by American parents as a toddler and has no criminal record. The Associated Press is not naming her because she worries her legal situation remains tenuous as the administration has time to appeal. A federal judge has allowed her to use a pseudonym, \u201cMs. S,\u201d in her challenge to the government\u2019s determination of her immigration status. <\/p>\n The woman received a letter from the Department of Homeland Security in February that ordered her to appear for removal proceedings, saying she is eligible for deportation because she overstayed her visa in March 1974 at 4 years old.<\/p>\n The woman, 56, described what came next as a terrifying and humiliating few months. <\/p>\n She grew up in a Christian, military family on a farm in Wisconsin and was taught to be patriotic. But the documents she received from the government described her as an \u201calien;\u201d some said she did not understand English, which is the only language she speaks. <\/p>\n Immigration officials told her she was being arrested, but released and tracked with an ankle monitor. She bought new pants to try to hide it and taught herself not to cross her legs in work meetings, terrified it would threaten the corporate job in healthcare she\u2019s held for almost two decades. <\/p>\n They fingerprinted her and took her DNA. She said she was obviously weeping in the mug shot they snapped of her. <\/p>\n She prepared herself to be detained: she put her bills on autopay and gave her friends a key to her home. <\/p>\n Her lawyer, Emily Howe, said the government had the power to agree she is an American citizen. <\/p>\n \u201cInstead they treated her like a terrorist, like she was the worst of the worst criminals,” Howe said. “It felt very Big Brother, very Orwellian.” <\/p>\n The Department of Homeland Security declined to comment on the record on an individual case. <\/p>\n