Senator Warren Invites Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang to Senate Hearing on China AI Chip Sales

Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., has invited Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang to testify before the Senate Banking Committee on June 11, pressing the chipmaker directly on its China business and the reach of U.S. export controls over advanced AI semiconductors.

Warren extended the invitation in a letter to Huang, asking him to confirm his attendance by Monday. "Appearing as a witness will give you an opportunity to testify about NVIDIA's views on U.S. export control laws and regulations and NVIDIA's business in China," Warren wrote in the letter.

The hearing would mark a rare opportunity for senators to question Huang directly on Nvidia's China strategy, coming just weeks after he accompanied President Donald Trump to China for a summit with Chinese President Xi Jinping.

Nvidia's chips underpin a large share of the world's advanced AI data centers, making the company central to both the global AI build-out and Washington's intensifying effort to limit China's access to cutting-edge U.S. semiconductor technology. Both the Biden and Trump administrations have moved to restrict such access, while Nvidia has maintained that overly broad limits risk eroding U.S. competitiveness and driving customers toward non-American suppliers.

Warren previewed her concerns Wednesday on CNBC's "Squawk Box," saying she is worried that U.S. companies are generating profit from technology sales that may compromise long-term national security. "The Chinese, in effect, buy our stuff, and American companies make a profit doing that," Warren said. "But it certainly undermines our long-term security."

She added that the chips in question go beyond general-purpose AI applications. "In China, these are chips that are actually used for military purposes," Warren said.

The Senate Banking Committee hearing arrives alongside a parallel push on the House side. Republicans on the House Energy and Commerce Committee are separately calling for an investigation into what they describe as China's efforts to impede U.S. AI and data-center development, underscoring the breadth of congressional concern on the issue.

Warren has also framed her scrutiny of Nvidia and the AI sector in domestic economic terms. In the same CNBC interview, she warned that AI-driven automation could cause significant disruption for American workers and called for an excise tax on data centers, with proceeds directed toward health care, child care, education, and job training. "We're talking about enormous disruption in ways that we can't anticipate," she said. "Now is the moment to get ahead of that."

Nvidia has not publicly responded to the invitation. Whether Huang will appear before the committee on June 11 remains an open question, and his decision is expected to draw significant attention from both national security observers and the investment community watching Washington's posture toward the AI industry.

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