House GOP Breaks With Hands-Off Line on Nvidia's Huang

The Republican leaders of three House committees on Thursday asked Jensen Huang, the chief executive of Nvidia, to voluntarily appear for a closed-door briefing on his interactions with an executive at a Singapore-based company. American officials determined that executive was funneling information to Chinese intelligence. The lawmakers invited Huang to an in-person joint briefing on Nov. 18, the day after Nvidia is scheduled to report its third-quarter earnings.

The request represented a shift for Republican congressional leaders, who have largely followed President Trump's lead in taking a hands-off approach to the technology industry.

What the chairmen want

The request came from Brian Mast, chairman of the House Committee on Foreign Affairs; John Moolenaar, who leads the House Select Committee on the Chinese Communist Party; and Rick Crawford, who chairs the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence. Their letter is dated Wednesday and was unveiled Thursday.

They are seeking information on Huang's interactions with Megaspeed executive Alice Huang, as well as Nvidia's "security protocols against foreign adversary espionage."

"Recent reports raise significant national security concerns regarding the PRC's access to sensitive U.S. technology and information," the lawmakers wrote. "It is vital that Congress determines the extent to which U.S. national security has been placed at risk."

The letter does not specify which reports it is referring to.

The relationship

The New York Times reported last week that Jensen Huang had a close relationship with Alice Huang, a top executive at Megaspeed. The U.S. government suspected the company of helping China evade U.S. prohibitions and gain access to Nvidia's AI chips. American spy agencies learned of the relationship through surveillance of Alice Huang.

Trump was briefed about a year ago on those intelligence findings, and he "chose not to do anything with the information," according to the newspaper. The Wall Street Journal subsequently reported that officials in at least three countries had concerns that Alice Huang was passing information to the Chinese government.

Alice Huang, a Chinese citizen, was listed as Megaspeed's managing director for its first eight months before removing herself from that role in corporate paperwork.

Megaspeed's sister company in Malaysia bought at least $4.8 billion of advanced AI equipment containing Nvidia chips and technology from June 2024 to February 2026, according to trade records obtained from ImportGenius. The U.S. government has been investigating Megaspeed since late 2024, when a Commerce Department official visited its data center in Malaysia and found the site to be suspicious. The Nvidia equipment was still packed in boxes.

Nvidia's answer

Nvidia has said that it complies with the law and that there is no evidence of its chips being smuggled to China. Last week, spokesman John Rizzo said Huang's "interactions with Ms. Huang are not unusual or unexpected."

"Meetings with customers are part of a CEO's job; Jensen talks with thousands of customer executives every year," a spokesperson said in the company's latest statement. "We're confident that if the U.S. government believes that any person is a threat to American industry, it would let us know."

The Chinese government previously called the allegations it was spying on Nvidia "groundless speculation." Megaspeed did not immediately respond to an email seeking comment.

Before the letter

In April 2025, Moolenaar's committee opened an investigation into Nvidia's sale of chips in Asia. In the months that followed, the Trump administration rolled back restrictions on Nvidia's chip sales to China.

Nvidia also donated more than $20 million to the White House ballroom and promised to invest $500 billion in U.S. manufacturing.

In June, Huang declined a request to appear before the Senate from Elizabeth Warren, a Democrat from Massachusetts and the ranking member of the Senate Banking Committee. Last week, Warren renewed her call for testimony.

Rizzo declined to comment on whether Huang would appear. "Our chief executive has an outstanding security team that accompanies him where needed," he said in a statement.

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Marcus Schuler

San Francisco

Editor-in-Chief and founder of Implicator.ai. Former ARD correspondent and senior broadcast journalist with 10+ years covering tech. Writes daily briefings on policy and market developments. Based in San Francisco. E-mail: editor@implicator.ai