The bill would give Congress the power to block AI exports to China and other U.S. political opponents.
The U.S. House of Representatives Foreign Affairs Committee has overwhelmingly voted to advance a bill that would give Congress more power over the export of artificial intelligence chips, despite pushback from White House AI czar David Sachs and a social media campaign against the bill.
Florida Rep. Brian Mast, the Republican chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, introduced the AI Surveillance Act in December after President Donald Trump gave the go-ahead to ship Nvidia’s powerful H200 AI chip to China.
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The bill, which still requires unanimity in the House and Senate, would give the House Foreign Affairs Committee and the Senate Banking Committee a 30-day grace period to review and potentially block licenses issued to export advanced AI chips to China and other adversaries.
The bill claims that these “countries of concern” include countries other than China, such as Russia, Iran, North Korea, Cuba, and Venezuela.
The bill also requires the U.S. Department of Commerce to submit a complete and detailed application to lawmakers demonstrating that the chips will not be used for military, intelligence, or surveillance purposes carried out by nations hostile to the United States.
One source said the chances of passage of the bill had increased following a concerted campaign against it in the media last week.
“These advanced chips need to be subject to the same oversight as other military-related systems,” Mast said in Wednesday’s session before the committee vote. “This is about the future of military warfare.”
Americans for Responsible Innovation, a technology advocacy group pushing for the bill, said in a fact sheet that the bill would “slow down China’s progress in developing AI that could potentially match U.S. capabilities.”
“The United States must win the AI arms race,” Mast said in a release when he first introduced the bill late last year.
White House backlash
Mr. Sacks’ press secretary and the White House did not respond to requests for comment.
Last week, Sachs shared a post from an X account called “Wall Street Luv” that claimed the bill was orchestrated by “Never Trumpers” and former staffers of Presidents Barack Obama and Joe Biden to undermine President Trump’s authority and America First strategy.
The post named Dario Amodei, CEO of AI company Anthropic, and claimed he had hired former Biden staffers to promote the issue.
“That’s right,” Sacks wrote.
An Anthropic spokesperson declined to comment on the allegations or the bill. But Amodei has been outspoken about blocking China from acquiring advanced chips like the H200.
“It would be a big mistake to ship these chips,” Amodei said Tuesday at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland. “I think this is strange. It’s like selling nuclear weapons to North Korea.”
Conservative activist Laura Loomer and others also criticized the bill on X last week, calling it “an act of pro-Beijing obstruction disguised as oversight.”
Before the vote, Mast and other committee members rejected online attacks.
“There are now special interest groups funded by millions of dollars from people and others who would profit from the sale of these chips… who are waging a social media campaign war against this bill,” said Rep. Michael McCaul, a Republican from Texas. “Shame on them.”
Nvidia did not respond to a request for comment, nor did the U.S. Department of Commerce, which oversees export controls.
