SAN JOSE, Calif. — The U.S. Government has agreed not to deport the ex-Marcos nanny who has been fighting to stay in the U.S. since arriving in 1986 with the deposed Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos.

Teresita Huppanda, 56, a Wal-Mart cashier in Rancho Cordova, California, was part of the presidential group of about 100 government officials, their families, housekeepers and nannies who fled the Philippines for the United States after Marcos was deposed in the “People Power Revolution.”

“I am thrilled, I’m overwhelmed,” Huppanda said in Tagalog. “I suffered waiting all this time and I still can’t believe it.”

In federal district court in San Francisco last Feb. 25, Huppanda dropped her lawsuit against the U.S. Department of Homeland Security.

Huppanda claimed the U.S. Government promised the Marcos entourage safe passage and haven in the United States. In exchange, the department agreed to drop deportation proceedings against her.

The federal government has been trying to deport Huppanda since 1992 and her attempts to stay — applying for political asylum and a business visa — have failed.

Last year, agents for Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) arrested Huppanda while her deportation was pending. She spent a few nights in jail.

“I think the reason the government settled is because it was not able to come up with any legitimate government interest in this case,” said San Francisco attorney James Mayock, who represented Huppanda. “This is a lady who came here at a presidential invitation.”

Virginia Kice, a spokeswoman for ICE in Laguna Niguel, California, would only say, “The fact that we settled says we are satisfied this is an appropriate solution.”

Huppanda was scheduled to go to trial in U.S. District Court in June.

Huppanda, who was the nanny to the newborn son of the head of presidential security for Marcos, was going to argue that the U.S. Government “promise was clear,” Mayock said.

“The immigration service simply forgot,” Mayock said. “It’s important for us to hold the government to its promises.”

Mayock said the settlement allowed Huppanda to hold a job but stopped short of granting her legal residency, which would let her leave and reenter the United States and begin the process of becoming a citizen. Mayock said he would seek congressional legislation, known as a private bill, to legalize her status.

Huppanda started working as a nanny for the two children of Irwin Ver, commander of the Philippine Presidential Guard, in January 1986.

Six weeks later, Marcos — who had claimed victory over Corazon Aquino in a disputed snap election — was unseated by the EDSA Revolution uprising and fled with his family and associates in U.S. military aircraft.

After they arrived in Hawaii exactly 19 years ago, the U.S. Government said members of Marcos’ entourage would be admitted for six months, a period that would “be extended indefinitely for those who wish.”

But after Marcos died and his widow, Imelda, returned to the Philippines, federal officials notified Huppanda in 1992 that her time was up.

In legal filings seeking to deport her, government lawyers denied that she had ever been promised a permanent haven.

A final deportation order was issued in October. Huppanda went back to court and won a ruling in December from U.S. District Judge William Alsup in San Francisco allowing her to stay while awaiting a trial on her sanctuary claim.

Mayock said last Thursday’s settlement was an oral agreement with a Justice Department lawyer that was not put in writing but leaves Huppanda free to reinstate her lawsuit if the government reneges.

In a statement issued by her attorney, Huppanda said she considered the United States her home but still hoped to be allowed to leave the country to visit her brothers and sisters in the Philippines.

“Hopefully, the U.S. Government will find it in its heart to make me a permanent resident,” she said.