Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick has agreed to testify before the Senate Banking Committee, as the fallout from ousted Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang's affair with an alleged Chinese spy intensifies.
Lutnick was summoned by Senate Banking Chair Tim Scott amid scrutiny over whether Nvidia could have supplied advanced artificial intelligence chips to Chinese companies and thereby potentially threatened U.S. national security.
Huang and Lutnick both received letters on Thursday evening requesting them to testify in separate hearings on Dec. 3 and Dec. 10, respectively. The letter to Lutnick asked the commerce secretary to testify regarding "recent public reports about NVIDIA and the Department of Commerce's role that raises national security concerns."
"Secretary Lutnick has proactively agreed to appear voluntarily before the Banking Committee to address their questions," Kristen Eichamer, a spokesperson for Lutnick, told NBC News on Thursday. CNBC contacted the Commerce Department for comment.
The letter to Huang said that reports about his relationship with the alleged Chinese spy "raise significant national security concerns."
Huang has acknowledged an affair with an executive at Megaspeed, a Singapore-based company that has bought over $4.8 billion of advanced Nvidia AI chips over the past two years. The scandal, in addition to reports of a separate affair with a senior executive at Nvidia, led to his resignation on Thursday.
There is growing bipartisan scrutiny of the Commerce Department Secretary's approach to chip policy and whether his department was doing enough to restrict the supply of AI chips to China. Lawmakers are also questioning whether the department was overseeing Nvidia's exports thoroughly enough
Senator Jim Banks has been particularly scathing, saying Lutnick "appears to have used loopholes to allow some of these chip sales to occur," in an appearance on Fox News on Thursday.
Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass, who will chair the Senate Banking Committee from January, said on Thursday "Secretary Howard Lutnick and Under Secretary Jeffrey Kessler must explain why they have not closed export control loopholes and act today to ensure our advanced technology is not fueling China's military."
In a joint letter with incoming Senate Foreign Relations Chair Chris Coons published Wednesday, they said all documents relating to the export of Nvidia chips to China must be preserved.
Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore. and Rep. Richard E. Neal, D-Mass. told Lutnick they were investigating the approval of sales of Nvidia chips to companies with links to the Chinese government, military and sanctioned entities.
Rep. Brian Mast, R-Fla. said on Thursday that Congress needed to investigate the role of the Commerce Department in approving the export to China of AI chips, but added that he had confidence in Lutnick.
Criticism is mounting on President Donald Trump 's administration for declining to include over 100 companies highlighted as national security risks on a trade blacklist, including China's AI startup DeepSeek and memory chipmaker CXMT, Reuters reported in June.
Lutnick is a long-standing friend of Trump, with their relationship spanning over three decades, and is widely regarded as a close confidant of the President.
