- Lawmakers want to know what the Trump administration did or did not do in response to that intelligence — and Lutnick, the department official at the center of export control policy, is squarely in their line of sight.
President Trump, however, does not distance himself from the secretary.
- “Secretary Lutnick is a champion of President Trump’s America First trade and tariff policies, which have delivered nearly 20 fair trade agreements and trillions in manufacturing investment,” a White House official told Axios.
- “President Trump maintains complete confidence in the Secretary and his ability to serve as the most transformative Secretary of Commerce in modern history.”
Catch up quickly: Lutnick received intelligence about Jensen Huang’s relationship with a suspected Chinese spy and repeatedly failed to take export control measures — despite pressure from the broader administration and the president himself, Axios first reported.
- Lutnick’s role is drawing attention from MPs on both sides of the Hill.
- “Secretary Howard Lutnick and Deputy Secretary Jeffrey Kessler must explain why they have failed to close export control loopholes and act today to ensure our cutting-edge technology does not fuel China’s military,” Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.), poised to be the next chairwoman of the Senate Banking Committee, said in a statement.
- “The obvious question is why did he choose to sell advanced chips?,” Sen. John Kennedy (R-La.) told Politico.
- “Secretary Lutnick must answer this question before God and before country,” Kennedy added. “I mean, there will be a congressional investigation. But I don’t think it should wait for Congress.”
The Ministry of Commerce has not confirmed for the record whether or not Lutnick saw the memo.
Yes, but: ““There’s no way Howard Lutnick didn’t know about this memo,” a senior administration official told Axios.
- “Of course Commerce got the memo. They had to get it. That’s the point of the memo. It’s about bullet points. Commerce deals with bullet points,” a second official said.
Meanwhile, Jensen Huang resigned as CEO of Nvidia following reports of a second affair with a direct report. He’s already admitted to an affair and apologized, but lawmakers on both sides of the aisle aren’t letting him off the hook either.
- “NVIDIA CEO Jensen Huang’s decision to resign does not absolve him, other executives, or the company as a whole of responsibility for putting our national security at risk or any potential violations of our laws,” Warren said.
- Republican House Foreign Affairs Chairman Brian Mast (Fla.) and House Intelligence Committee Chairman Rick Crawford (Ark.) told reporters Thursday that Huang’s resignation does not change their plans to investigate him and the company, Bloomberg Government reported.
- “Jensen Huang himself has been a pretty bold, some might even say arrogant, promoter of sort of dismissing our concerns about China’s access to these most advanced chips. And I don’t take that lightly…I would be happy to support a subpoena,” Republican Sen. Kevin Cramer (ND) said on CNBC.
The bottom line: Resignations and apologies aside, Washington is ready to hold someone accountable as the FBI, Congress and Nvidia’s board all investigate in tandem.
Gn bussni
