It’s just wrong: The Navy reimbursed families forced to evacuate their housing when the Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam water system was contaminated by fuel spilled from the Red Hill storage facility, and now these environmental disaster refugees are being hit with a federal tax bill for the military payments, classified as income.

The Navy spent approximately $90 million on housing-affected families; that could trigger quite a tax bill in total. Hawaii’s congressional delegation has stepped up to ask the Internal Revenue Service to exempt this emergency assistance from taxation; if the IRS cannot do this, President Joe Biden should.