EXCLUSIVE [to FOX News]: The University of North Carolina, which is currently considering giving illegal immigrants in-state tuition benefits, denied an Army sergeant the same break at its Pembroke branch even though she owns a home in the Tar Heel state and only moved away briefly because the military stationed her husband in Texas.

Hayleigh Perez, 26, hoped to use her G.I. Bill to attend the UNC’s Pembroke campus near Fort Bragg, but the young veteran — who served a 14-month tour in Iraq — was told she did not qualify as a state resident because she had been gone for about three years.

“I got frustrated. When I tried to inquire, they kept putting up roadblocks,” Perez told FoxNews.com. “It’s just disgraceful that life in Iraq, where you could die, is easier than trying to go to school here.”

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