Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent blamed the Commerce Department on Friday for failing to restrict Megaspeed, a Nvidia customer and the company at the heart of former Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang’s spy-sex scandal, from exporting chips.
Officials at the Treasury Department, the Pentagon and the State Department wanted to put restrictions on Megaspeed for months, “but Commerce has the pen,” and did not add the company to the export control list, Bessent said on CNBC’s “Squawk Box.”
“You will have to have to ask them about their internal processes,” Bessent said.
Generally, the Commerce Department is charged with managing exports of sensitive U.S. technologies. Commerce had been investigating whether Singapore-based Megaspeed was routing Nvidia’s cutting-edge chips to Chinese firms in breach of U.S. export restrictions.
Bessent’s comments mark the first time Bessent has publicly attacked the agency run by Howard Lutnick, after revelations that Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang had an affair with Megaspeed employee and suspected Chinese spy Alice Huang.
Huang resigned Thursday amid reports of two affairs that included a woman suspected of being a Chinese spy, a stunning downfall for one of the world’s most powerful executives.
In response to Huang’s advocacy, the Trump administration last year green-lit the sale of certain Nvidia chips to Chinese firms in exchange for a cut of sales. China hawks have contended that allowing Chinese companies to access the powerful chips hurts U.S. standing in the AI race.
Now, lawmakers on Capitol Hill are pushing Huang to testify about his relationship with Alice Huang, a technology executive for Megaspeed who is suspected of being a Chinese intelligence asset. (Alice Huang and Jensen Huang have no relation.)
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