Khanna secured 62.3% of the vote in the primary elections and advanced to the general election. Indian American Congressman Ro Khanna is back in the headlines as he seeks re-election to represent California ’s 17th Congressional District in the US House of Representatives . A member of the Democratic Party, he will be competing against another Indian American, Ritesh Tandon. He is one of the most notable political figures who pushed for the release of the Jeffrey Epstein files.
Khanna was elected to the US House of Representatives in 2016 and took office in January 2017. He also co-authored a bill that shaped the CHIPS and Science Act of 2022. Khanna was born on September 13, 1976, in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania , to Indian immigrant parents. He supports raising the federal minimum wage to at least $17 an hour, expanding paid family leave and making childcare more affordable. In 2025, he joined Republican Congressman Thomas Massie and introduced a bipartisan War Powers Resolution, in order to prevent unauthorized US military action against Iran. In 2016, Ro Khanna’s campaign faced a legal dispute when Democratic Congressman Mike Honda filed a lawsuit accusing Khanna’s campaign manager, Brian Parvizshahi, of accessing confidential information from Honda’s campaign without permission. The information included personal details of more than 10,000 donors.
He has represented California’s 17th Congressional District, which includes parts of Silicon Valley as well. Before entering Congress, he served as deputy assistant secretary of commerce under former President Barack Obama . His father is a chemical engineer, while his mother worked as a substitute teacher. His grandfather, Amarnath Vidyalanker, was involved in India’s freedom struggle , worked with Lala Lajpat Rai and spent four years in jail for opposing British rule in India. Khanna has often spoken about how his grandfather’s experiences influenced his own interest in public services. His campaign fiercely focuses on reducing living costs, expanding healthcare access and making education more affordable. He supports Medicare for All, a proposal to provide health coverage to all Americans. He has also backed affordable housing, childcare assistance and measures to reduce prescription drug costs. He believes that working families need more financial security and an increased access to basic services. Khanna has also called for stronger protection of workers and supports the labor unions. He is a staunch supporter of the Protecting the Right to Organize (PRO) Act, which aims to make it easier for workers to form unions and negotiate with employers. Apart from immigration, Khanna has given jobs and economy a center stage in his campaign. He has proposed to invest in vocational training, apprenticeship programs and trade schools. This way, he aims to help workers gain more skills and create more high paying jobs. He has further raised his voice to strengthen labor protection laws in order to ensure that workers receive fair wages. Khanna has opposed the US-Iran war , arguing that military action should not continue without congressional approval. He continues to argue that the president’s authority to wage a war without approval should be limited. He believes that this conflict has increased costs for American families and placed a financial burden on them. Honda alleged that this was a violation of federal laws. Parvizshahi later resigned from Khanna’s campaign, while Khanna clarified that he had no personal knowledge about the incident.
