The Donald Trump administration on Tuesday established new directives to strengthen U.S. immigration control, unveiling an aggressive plan that includes accelerating deportation procedures for undocumented migrants and hiring 15,000 new agents.

“The surge of illegal immigration at the southern border has overwhelmed federal agencies and resources and has created a significant national security vulnerability to the United States,” Department of Homeland Security (DHS) Secretary John Kelly wrote in one of two memos he sent to members of his department regarding the new directives.

The memo launches an 180-degree change in the immigration policies of former President Barack Obama and opens the door to the massive deportation of undocumented migrants.

Specifically, it says that not only undocumented migrants with serious criminal violations on their records but also those who have “abused” the available public benefits or, in the judgment of an immigration agent, could pose a danger to public safety or national security may now be quickly deported.

The memo also says that the DHS will not exempt any classes or categories of undocumented foreigners from deportation, except for young undocumented migrants known as “Dreamers” who were brought to the U.S. as very young children and have grown up there.

At his daily press briefing, White House press secretary Sean Spicer said Tuesday that the aim of the new plan is to give the DHS more authorities to enforce immigration laws, noting that anyone who is in the U.S. illegally can be deported at any time.

Obama had ordered that – generally – only those immigrants with serious criminal histories could be deported, in effect exempting undocumented foreigners with who had committed minor violations of the law, such as driving without a license or having a broken taillight on their vehicle.

The Trump administration, however, says that insufficient resources have been devoted to immigration enforcement and is ordering the hiring of 15,000 new immigration agents, along with authorizing state and local agents to take part in immigration enforcement duties along with federal officials.

Criticism of the new plan erupted immediately from the Democratic opposition and immigrant defense groups.

Democratic Nevada Sen. Catherine Cortez Masto, the first Latina to be elected to the upper house, said on her Twitter account that, “Mass deportations are morally reprehensible and un-American. We are better than this.”

Her Democratic colleague from Illinois, Dick Durbin, urged “an immediate public examination in Congress of these heavy-handed, anti-family policies.”

“These memos confirm that the Trump administration is willing to trample on due process, human decency, the well-being of our communities, and even protections for vulnerable children, in pursuit of a hyper-aggressive mass deportation policy,” said American Civil Liberties Union director Omar Jadwat.

DREAMERS have been protected under former President Barack Obama’s 2012 Deferred Action program (DACA), whereby they were able to fend off deportation, obtain driver’s licenses and work permits in exchange for renewing their protection under the program every two years.

In addition, the Trump administration emphasized three priority zones for building the U.S.-Mexico border wall the president promised – El Paso, Texas; Tucson, Arizona; and El Centro, California – and the document orders authorities to immediately identify and allocate available resources to planning, designing, building and maintaining such a wall, along with preparing congressional budget requests for the current and subsequent fiscal years.

Recent estimates are that such a wall will cost upwards of $21.6 billion, and although Trump has insisted that Mexico will pay for the project, the U.S.’ southern neighbor has adamantly refused to do so. EFE