Lawmakers Vary on Trump Allowing Sale of Nvidia H200 Chips to China

Reps. John Moolenaar, R-Mich., and Raja Krishnamoorthi, D-Ill., chairman and ranking member, respectively, of the House Select Committee on China, both issued statements opposing Trump’s decision.

“Publicly available analysis indicates that the H200 provides 32% more processing power and 50% more memory bandwidth than China’s best chip,” Moolenaar said. China “will use these highly advanced chips to strengthen its military capabilities and totalitarian surveillance.” Moolenaar also expects China will “rip off” Nvidia’s technology, “mass produce it themselves, and seek to end Nvidia as a competitor.”

Krishnamoorthi said that “allowing the export of advanced U.S. AI chips to the Chinese Communist Party would be a profound national security mistake and a gift to our top strategic competitor.”

In contrast, Sen. Mike Rounds, R-S.D., said that Trump’s decision “may very well be” the best approach. By giving China advanced chips but “not our best chips,” the president is “doing his best to try to make sure that we control the long-term development of AI, and that’s a step in the right direction,” Rounds told reporters.

Sen. Bill Hagerty, R-Tenn., said the president had to consider many factors, including maintaining the competitiveness of U.S. industry. "I don't presume to second-guess the intelligence that the president relied upon to make his decision, but I acknowledge that it's a complicated situation and it's not an easy answer," Hagerty told Export Compliance Daily.

Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Mo., told reporters he hopes to get more information on the China decision, including the “safety precautions” the Trump administration plans to take. But Hawley said he’s “generally not a big fan of giving [China] more chips. I’d like to see them get fewer chips.”

Several senators, including Sen. John Cornyn, R-Texas, said they are still studying the matter. "I want to learn a little bit more about it," Cornyn told reporters. "Obviously, we don't want to sell them the crown jewels because they're our principal international competitor. So I need more information."

Sen. Chris Coons, D-Del., said that a bill he recently introduced with Sen. Pete Ricketts, R-Neb., would block the sale of H200s and comparable chips to China (see 2512040052). But Coons isn’t sure his bipartisan bill will pass through Congress.

“What we’ve seen, sadly, for this whole year is that when President Trump takes a position forcefully, no matter how strongly my Republican colleagues believe the opposite, he tends to get his way,” Coons told reporters. “This is an important moment for Congress to make clear that we have an Article I role in our Constitution, particularly in pressing matters of national security.”

Coons and seven other Senate Democrats, including Senate Foreign Relations Committee ranking member Jeanne Shaheen, N.H., issued a joint statement urging Trump to reverse his decision. Coons and Shaheen were joined by Sens. Jack Reed of Rhode Island, Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, Brian Schatz of Hawaii, Andy Kim of New Jersey, Michael Bennet of Colorado and Elissa Slotkin of Michigan.

“The H200s are vastly more capable than anything China can make and gifting them to Beijing would squander America’s primary advantage in the AI race,” their statement says. The chips also “would give China’s military transformational technology to make its weapons more lethal, carry out more effective cyberattacks against American businesses and critical infrastructure, and strengthen their economic and manufacturing sector.”

Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., also called for Trump to reverse course. “Let’s be clear,” Schumer said in a Senate floor speech, “you can’t claim to be tough on China if you willingly sell them some of the most advanced chips in the world so they can use [them] to strengthen their military.”