Senate summons Lutnick and Huang over Nvidia chip leak questions

The US Senate Banking Committee has summoned Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick and former Nvidia chief Jensen Huang to testify in December over possible Nvidia chip deliveries to China that circumvented US export bans. Lutnick has already agreed to appear, a ministry spokesperson told NBC. Huang has not — and committee chairman Tim Scott, a Republican, has threatened him with a subpoena if he doesn't testify voluntarily.

The hearing lands days after a dramatic exit. Huang resigned as Nvidia CEO on Thursday over an espionage-adjacent scandal: US security agencies believe a Chinese woman with whom he had a relationship may have been recruited by Chinese intelligence.

What does this change for export controls?

At the core of the inquiry sits a Singapore-registered company called Megaspeed. The woman at the center of the Huang affair worked there for a time. US authorities suspect Megaspeed secretly moved AI chips bought from Nvidia into China despite the bans. According to US media reports, Nvidia shipped roughly four billion dollars' worth of technology to Megaspeed.

That number puts Lutnick directly on the defensive. Export control falls under his department, and lawmakers now want to know how four billion dollars in hardware reached a suspected smuggling channel on his watch. The pressure isn't partisan. Democrats are demanding answers, but so are members of President Donald Trump's own Republican caucus.

For context: Washington's sales prohibitions on Nvidia's high-performance chips are designed to slow Chinese progress in artificial intelligence. Huang publicly favored selling to China anyway. His argument — that sales bind China to US technology rather than fueling the development of rival systems that could compete with Nvidia on the world market — is now part of the political record senators will interrogate.

How far up does this go?

The scandal may not stop at the Commerce Department. Democrats also want clarity on what President Trump knew about the affair, and when. That question — raised explicitly by the party's lawmakers — extends the affair from an export-control failure into a potential White House disclosure issue.

The December hearing will be public. Scott cited national security concerns in his invitation, framing the session as the start of the reckoning rather than its end. Huang's resignation closed one chapter; the testimony of both men under oath opens the next.

Three threads will dominate:

• Whether Nvidia's $4 billion in shipments to Megaspeed violated US export law, or exploited gaps Lutnick's department failed to close.
• Whether Huang's personal relationship compromised decisions on China sales he had long championed.
• What the White House knew about the affair, and when Trump was informed.

No hearing date beyond "December" has been set. What's certain: the Senate has questions, the Commerce Secretary will answer them, and Huang's appearance — voluntary or compelled — will decide whether the former CEO's exit softens or sharpens the scandal.