More than three dozen Democratic and independent senators are asking Department of Homeland Security Secretary Kristi Noem to clarify the agency's position on beneficiaries of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program.

Also known as DACA, the program was created in 2012 to protect from deportation children who arrived in the country illegally prior to 2007 and now benefits some half a million people.

The letter , which was shared exclusively with NPR, comes in response to a DHS statement to NPR earlier this summer which said that "illegal aliens who claim to be recipients of Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) are not automatically protected from deportations" and that "DACA does not confer any form of legal status in this country." DHS assistant press secretary

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