WASHINGTON (TNND) — California Democratic Rep. Ro Khanna said that Congress should have been pushing for the release of the files related to disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein under the Biden administration.

During an interview with podcast host Shawn Ryan, Khanna said that sometimes he gets a “gotcha” question about the Epstein files about why releasing the files wasn’t a priority under former President Joe Biden.

“First of all, I did speak out in 2019, but second I say, ‘Yeah we should have. We were wrong,” Khanna said.

“This country has been asleep. That’s not a reason not to care. I’ve gotten to know these survivors. All of us were guilty for 25 years-other than a few journalists, for not caring [and] abandoning these girls.”

Khanna and Kentucky GOP Rep. Thomas Massie have been working together in a bipartisan manner to release the Epstein files. They both said they want to hold Attorney General Pam Bondi in inherent contempt of congress since the Department of Justice failed to release all the files by Dec. 19, 2025.

Epstein died in prison in August 2019 as he was awaiting for a trial on sex trafficking charges of minors and conspiracy to commit sex trafficking.

Khanna said during the interview that he believed there were three types of abusers that were involved with Epstein.

“[There are] ones who actually raped underage girls,” he said.

“I would say at least a dozen or a handful. I’m not saying that’s the biggest number.the second [are] people who showed up at these parties and saw young girls parading around and knew they were being abused and didn’t say anything and covered it up. That number is in the hundreds.”

Khanna said that the third group of abusers were people who trafficked girls who were slightly over the age of 19 or 20, but they may have been raped or abused when they were younger.

When Ryan asked how long this has been going on, Khanna said, “Decades.”