The media-fed image that recipients of the Obama-era Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals are kids in college took another hit this week when the agency that oversees the program said the average age was 23.8 years, older than the typical 22-year-old graduate.



What's more, said U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services, 35 percent of are aged 26-36.

USCIS said that while 800,000 have been a part of the program since its inception, only 689,800 are still in it.

Critics of the program have pushed back against the image that the DACA recipients are youngsters headed to or are in college and the new information from USCIS backs that up.

A Harvard study cited in the current debate by the Center for Immigration Studies, for example, also found that only a minority can take the claim to be "dreamers," those who dreamed of going to college and graduating. Other details they cited from the study:

73 percent of DACA recipients he surveyed live in a low-income household (defined as qualifying for free lunch in high school).

22 percent have earned a degree from a four-year college or university.

20 percent have dropped out of high school.

20 percent have no education beyond high school and no plans to attend college.

36 percent have a parent who holds a bachelor's degree.

Virtually all of those in the program have come from Latin America. In its analysis of the USCIS data, the Pew Research Center found:

Current DACA recipients come from around the world, but more than nine-in-ten were born in Latin America. Mexico is by far the top country of origin for active DACA recipients (548,000), followed by El Salvador (25,900), Guatemala (17,700) and Honduras (16,100). A significant number of DACA recipients also hail from Peru (7,420), South Korea (7,310), Brazil (5,780), Ecuador (5,460), Colombia (5,020) and Argentina (3,970).

By region, almost all current DACA recipients were born in Mexico or Central or South America (648,430, or 94%). Another 18,940 (3%) were born in Asia, followed by the Caribbean (8,350), Europe (5,190) and Africa (4,240).

Congress is poised to begin debating the future of those still in DACA now that President Trump has killed the program. Some can stay in it for two more years and Trump and congressional leaders are not eager to begin deporting them.

Paul Bedard, the Washington Examiner's "Washington Secrets" columnist, can be contacted at pbedard@washingtonexaminer.com