Sen. Chris Coons (D-DE) is promising that Congress will dig into the Trump administration’s ties to Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang, after a New York Times report that a Chinese businesswoman close to Huang was an asset of Beijing’s top spy agency.
“The more I learn about the insane relationship between the Trump Administration, Chinese spies, and AI billionaires, the more I’m convinced there is nothing this administration does that isn’t corrupt,” Coons wrote on social media on Saturday. “Congress will investigate and get answers.”
Coons’ post drew nearly 300,000 views. His threat carries more weight after Democrats won control of the Senate on Tuesday, which will give them subpoena power and committee gavels in January.
The Times reported that a memo circulated among top Trump administration policymakers last spring cited intelligence that Alice Huang, a Chinese executive who developed a close relationship with Jensen Huang, was working for China’s Ministry of State Security. The two are not related.
According to people briefed on the intelligence, Alice Huang was recruited to collect intelligence on the Nvidia chief. It was part of a drive by Beijing to learn more about American AI chips and potentially influence the company to push for its most advanced chips to be made available to China.
The Times previously reported that Trump was briefed last year about Huang’s relationship with the woman “but chose not to do anything about it.”
Jensen Huang is one of Trump’s most influential allies in the tech world. In 2025, he persuaded Trump to roll back a ban on AI chip sales to China, according to the Times. The two later struck a deal allowing Nvidia to sell its second-most-powerful chip to China, with the U.S. government taking a 25% cut of sales.
Alice Huang’s company, Megaspeed, began a multibillion-dollar purchase of advanced AI chips in 2024. It has built data centers in Southeast Asia and rented their computing power to Chinese internet giant Alibaba, which the Times described as “a backdoor way” for China to access advanced Nvidia chips it can’t buy directly.
Republicans are paying attention too. On Thursday, the GOP leaders of three House committees asked Jensen Huang to appear at a closed-door briefing later this month about his interactions with Alice Huang.
Nvidia spokesman John Rizzo told the Times that the company does not share classified information with customers, and that Huang’s interactions with Alice Huang were “not unusual.” A spokesman for the Chinese embassy called the reporting “unsubstantiated” and “nothing but smears against China.” The White House and CIA declined to comment.
Susan Rice, who served as national security adviser to former President Barack Obama, sounded the alarm, too. “This is insane. Huge national security threat. WTAF?” Rice wrote on social media, sharing a post from Chris McGuire, a former national security official, that recapped the reporting on the alleged spy operation.