WASHINGTON — Former President Barack Obama on Tuesday called the Trump administration’s decision to repeal a program protecting young immigrants from deportation “cruel” and “self-defeating.” He urged Congress to pass a bill fixing the situation “with a sense of moral urgency.”

In a Facebook message, Obama said repealing the program casts a shadow over some of the nation’s best and brightest young people. “To target these young people is wrong — because they have done nothing wrong,” he wrote.

The former president’s statement came as President Donald Trump announced the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program will end in six months.

Trump and his supporters, including Attorney General Jeff Sessions, have called it unconstitutional.

The Obama administration created the DACA program in 2012 as a stopgap as they pushed unsuccessfully for a broader immigration overhaul in Congress. Many Republicans opposed the program on the grounds that it was executive overreach.

Obama added that deporting DACA recipients does not make sense, since “kicking them out won’t lower the unemployment rate, or lighten anyone’s taxes, or raise anybody’s wages.”

“It is self-defeating — because they want to start new businesses, staff our labs, serve in our military and otherwise contribute to the country we love,” Obama said. “And it is cruel. What if our kid’s science teacher or our friendly neighbor turns out to be a Dreamer?”