Khanna unveils funding for South Bay facility that assists sexual assault survivors

Congressman Ro Khanna, who has been central in the fight to get the Epstein files released, announced more than $100,000 in funding Thursday for a South Bay facility that helps sexual assault survivors.

Khanna made the announcement during a visit to the SAFE+ Program enhancement center in Santa Clara County, a facility that provides free resources 24/7 to survivors of sexual assault, intimate partner violence and gender-based violence. Khanna recently secured $175,000 in funding for the center to help empower victims he said seem very familiar to him.

"I’ve been very involved with getting the Epstein files out and holding the Epstein class accountable, so I’m particularly sensitive to sexual assault and rape that girls and young women go through," Khanna said. "This safe center is dealing with that on a daily basis. They have people who have faced sexual assault, domestic violence. They provide them with emotional care, health care and help them deal with law enforcement."

SAFE+ said the funding will help the center expand and train those helping assault survivors.

"As you can imagine, it’s a highly specialized program that most medical practitioners aren’t trained in," SAFE+ nurse manager Anna Anton said. "The training and recruitment and retention of this is a challenge. This will allow us to speed up our training program and keep us up to date on current trends in evidence collection."

In terms of the Epstein files, Khanna said Pam Bondi’s recent exit from the Trump administration will make it more difficult to get them all released, but he said her high-profile dismissal is also attracting more people to the effort.

"I do expect a fight, but we have been working in a bipartisan basis," he said. "In fact, just today, Marjorie Taylor Greene said I look forward to working with you to keep us out of war and to get more of the files released. This is an issue that’s not political."

Khanna emphasized the focus always needs to be on the victims, and he said the 3 million files that haven’t been released have more details regarding who did what, where and when.