20 NatSec experts and former officials urge Trump Admin to block H20 sales to China.
On Monday, a coalition of twenty national security experts and former officials urged Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick to enforce export control restrictions on the sale of advanced H20 chips to China. In a letter to the Administration, the coalition points out that the H20 is a potent accelerator of China’s development of frontier AI, and that advanced AI developed in China will undoubtedly be deployed to support China’s military. The letter comes just two weeks after Nvidia announced that the Trump Administration would be rolling back export controls and allowing the sale of the H20.
Among the letter signers are a number of leading policy experts, including American Compass founder Oren Cass, as well as former national security officials, including Stewart Baker, Former Assistant Secretary of Homeland Security; Matt Pottinger, Former Deputy National Security Advisor; David Feith, Former National Security Council; Brad Carson, former Undersecretary of the Army and Acting Undersecretary of Defense; and Lloyd Thrall, Former Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense.
“If we want America to lead on AI, then the US shouldn’t be selling Chinese firms the exact thing they need to build out AI infrastructure,” said ARI President Brad Carson. “Lifting export restrictions on the H20 lifts the bottleneck holding back China’s development of advanced AI technology that will be integrated in their military. There’s a reason that defense experts and former officials are speaking up on this, and that’s because it isn’t just a question of trade, it’s a question of national security.”
“For years, American business leaders believed that transferring technology to China would secure them a lasting foothold there,” said American Compass founder Oren Cass. “They were duped, and then discarded as soon as China developed indigenous alternatives. The U.S. government is about to make the same mistake, in the futile hope of a lasting American advantage. The result will be to slow American progress, accelerate Chinese progress, and drive up the share price of multinational corporations at the expense of the national interest.”
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Americans for Responsible Innovation (ARI) is a nonprofit organization dedicated to policy advocacy in the public interest, focused on emerging technologies like artificial intelligence (AI). Learn more at ARI.us.