After Jensen Huang’s exit, US lawmakers push to tighten AI chip exports to China and call Lutnick to testify

A consensus in Congress

The resignation of Nvidia’s chief executive, Jensen Huang, has revived pressure in Washington to restrict China’s access to advanced AI chips, the Guardian and the South China Morning Post reported. Huang stepped down after reports of a romantic relationship with a businesswoman whom US authorities suspect of spying for the Chinese government.

The House Speaker, Mike Johnson, told reporters at the Capitol that he favoured limiting China’s access to the technology, the Guardian reported, citing Reuters.

“I think there’s a developing consensus in Congress that is an important position to take.”

Mike Johnson, The Guardian World

Congressional Republicans want to attach new restrictions to the annual defence authorisation bill, a must-pass measure that usually has support from both parties, a Senate aide told Reuters. The South China Morning Post said the timing was particularly sensitive because lawmakers are debating that bill now.

Questions for the Commerce Department

The commerce secretary, Howard Lutnick, has agreed to appear voluntarily before the Senate Banking Committee, his spokesperson Kristen Eichamer told NBC News. The committee’s chair, Tim Scott, asked for a public hearing on the department’s role and has also asked Huang to testify. The department was meant to review companies for national security risks before the Trump administration let Nvidia sell advanced chips to China.

Lawmakers have criticised Lutnick over the administration’s decision not to add DeepSeek, the memory chipmaker CXMT and more than 100 other Chinese companies to a trade blacklist. The US has not added anyone to that list since October 2025. The Republican senator Jim Banks said Nvidia had fought earlier attempts to tighten the rules.

“Nvidia opposed my legislation a year ago. They opposed other export control laws.”

Jim Banks, The Guardian World

The Democratic senator Elizabeth Warren, who will chair the committee from January, asked the administration to preserve all documents on Nvidia’s chip exports to China.

Fallout abroad

Malaysia’s trade ministry said it was investigating whether a local subsidiary of Megaspeed, the Singapore-based data centre company linked to the scandal, had re-exported advanced AI chips to other countries. Chinese AI companies are trying to secure Nvidia chip capacity outside China, fearing that gaps in US export controls may now be closed, Reuters reported.

Inside Nvidia, the interim chief executive, Colette Kress, is expected to approach Washington by trying to make friends rather than picking a fight over export controls as Huang did, a source told Reuters.