Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent directly blamed the Commerce Department for delaying the broader administration’s intent to place Nvidia customer Megaspeed on a special blacklist of companies that could pose a national security threat.
In a CNBC interview Friday morning, Bessent said the U.S. Trade Representative and the Treasury, War, and State departments were “in favor of putting Megaspeed on the entity list for months.” However, he noted, the Commerce Department “has the pen.”
The comment suggests behind-the-scenes tensions between Bessent and Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick in light of the fallout from former Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang’s affairs, which sent the chipmaker’s shares tumbling since the news broke earlier this week.
Huang reportedly had an extramarital affair with a suspected Chinese spy named Alice Huang, a Chinese business executive who worked at Megaspeed. The Singapore-based cloud computing company is one of Nvidia’s largest foreign customers.
Nvidia is leading an independent investigation into Jensen Huang’s affairs. The technology company previously said it “has no reason to believe that either national security or NVIDIA secrets were compromised.”
The Justice Department has not yet concluded whether Alice Huang acted as a Chinese intelligence asset in her interactions with Nvidia’s chief executive, according to Attorney General Todd Blanche.
It was also revealed that Jensen Huang may have had two more affairs, one with Kimberly Powell, vice president of healthcare at Nvidia, and another with an unnamed female employee.
Amid the scandalous revelations, Jensen Huang resigned from his role at Nvidia on Thursday. He co-founded the company in 1993 and continued serving as its president and chief executive until his abrupt resignation over 33 years later.
Jensen Huang has agreed to give a closed-door briefing to Congress by Thanksgiving. Separately, he was asked to appear at a Dec. 3 hearing held by the Senate banking committee. The panel’s chairman, Sen. Tim Scott (R-SC), also asked Lutnick to testify on Dec. 10. The commerce secretary has agreed to participate in that hearing.
Lutnick is facing scrutiny over reports on the Commerce Department’s export controls of Nvidia chips, which Megaspeed is allegedly smuggling into China. The company is under active investigation by American and Singaporean authorities. Megaspeed reportedly paid more than $4.8 billion for Nvidia’s advanced chips over two years.
SEN. TIM SCOTT CALLS ON LUTNICK AND HUANG TO TESTIFY OVER NATIONAL SECURITY CONCERNS
Bessent suggested his frustrations lie with Lutnick when it comes to the administration’s handling of Nvidia chips as they relate to national security.
“I am frustrated when President Trump made it very clear that China should not receive any Nvidia chips above H100s,” he said of a particular high-performance chip model. “And so any leakage is very frustrating because it hurts our great companies and the AI race gives the Chinese an advantage.”