For all the raised consciousness about the Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders as a defined group, there are specific populations with needs too easily overlooked by the federal government. Those Pacific people who come to the U.S. under the Compacts of Free Association (COFA) exemplify this failing — a problem with spillover effects on Hawaii and other places where they have settled.

The compacts are agreements — originally signed about 35 years ago — between the U.S. and the Federated States of Micronesia, the Republic of the Marshall Islands and the Republic of Palau. These are pacts in which the federal government authorizes freedom of migration to the U.S., as well as to provide financial assistance.

That is where the feds have been falling short. Fortunately, there is a bipartisan push to restore benefits to this population, disproportionately hit by economic hardship, now including those caused by COVID-19.

According to the Government Accountability Office, about 100,000 COFA citizens live in the United States and its Pacific territories, principally in Hawaii, Guam, Washington, Arkansas, Oregon and California.

The accords were created in part as compensation for the loss of life, health, land and other resources due to the nuclear weapons testing on the Marshall Islands and Bikini and Enewetak atolls from 1946 to 1958. And they were agreements struck because these islands remain of strategic importance to the U.S.

The migrants here and elsewhere have been under increasing distress since 1996. That’s when the U.S. welfare reform law passed and the federal government began denying them benefits available to other legal permanent residents. Hawaii’s congressional delegation, rightly, has taken up the charge to get the aid back.

The latest effort is the introduction of bills in the U.S. House and Senate, with Hawaii’s Congressman Ed Case and U.S. Sen. Mazie Hirono, among the chief sponsors. The Compact Impact Fairness Act, Hirono said, aims to fulfill promises made to the COFA nations and “assists states like Hawaii that have traditionally worked without a fully-invested federal partner in supporting this community.”

Democrats Hirono and Case, and their Republican co-sponsor, U.S. Rep. Steve Womack of Arkansas, hope to capture some of the momentum created with the success of the 2020 year-end spending bill that restored Medicaid eligibility to COFA migrants.

The new legislation seeks further to restore eligibility for public benefits such as “food stamps” (officially, the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program), Temporary Assistance for Needy Families, Supplemental Security Income, Social Services Block Grants, education assistance and disaster-assistance grants.

Essentially, the act would give COFA migrants the same access to public benefits as permanent legal “green card” residents. This is equitable: The migrants also are in the U.S. lawfully and for the long term. It does not ensure privileges accorded only to U.S. citizens, including access to federal and state government grants, scholarships and other benefits.

COFA citizens are contributing members of local society, paying general excise taxes in Hawaii, enlisting in the military. Hawaii has sought to provide social-services help to them — on its own dime, for the long years when Medicaid was stripped away. Federal Medicaid dollars are back, but Hawaii and other states still need help in serving this community, especially in the current recessionary period.

Above all, the act is about fulfilling a commitment to Pacific neighbors and strategic partners. Congress should move it promptly to the president’s desk.