Thousands of refugees and other legal immigrants who were permitted to relocate permanently to the United States because they face persecution in their home countries now confront destitution as a result of losing federal subsistence aid. Extremely poor refugees and other humanitarian immigrants who are unable to work because they are elderly or have disabilities are eligible for subsistence aid under the Supplemental Security Income (SSI) program. But under restrictions enacted a decade ago, their eligibility for such aid is limited to seven years, unless they become naturalized citizens. The Social Security Administration estimates that as a result of the time limit approximately 12,000 refugees and other humanitarian immigrants have already lost SSI benefits and another 40,000 such needy individuals will lose benefits over the next decade. (See Table 1.) Congress should prevent this extremely vulnerable group from suffering further hardship by eliminating the time limit on SSI benefits for refugees and other humanitarian immigrants who are elderly or have disabilities. Bipartisan legislation that is consistent with an Administration proposal to temporarily extend the time limit has been introduced and at the very least Congress should immediately enact such legislation as a stopgap measure.