Nobel Prize-winning economist Paul Krugman says the Nvidia honeypot scandal reveals far more about Donald Trump’s White House than about the tech billionaire at its center.
In a Thursday Substack post and video titled “Climates of Treason,” Krugman said Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang should be permanently barred from national security matters, but that the real story lies elsewhere.
“The way the Trump administration handled it — basically, its attempt to bury any inquiry into the clear threat Huang’s affair posed to U.S. interests — is part of a bigger story of betrayal at the highest levels,” Krugman told viewers.
Huang has admitted to an affair with Alice Huang, a former Megaspeed executive whom U.S. officials suspect of spying for China. The two are not related.
Trump said Huang told him he didn’t know she was a spy, and China has denied the espionage claims. Nvidia’s board has said it has seen no sign that national security was compromised.
A source told CNN that Trump was briefed on the intelligence in May aboard Air Force One, before Huang joined his trip to Beijing, though Trump has insisted he only recently learned of the allegations. On Sunday, he called Huang honorable and said he probably had an excuse.
Krugman took his title from a 1979 British book about Cambridge graduates who spied for the Soviet Union out of ideological conviction. He argued that Trump’s circle is fueled by a cocktail of ideology and greed. In his view, MAGA’s support for Russia’s war on Ukraine is largely ideological, while its handling of Huang and chip sales to China comes down to money.
He pointed to Nvidia’s $25 million commitment to Trump’s White House ballroom and argued that Trump's allies protected Huang in part because they worried the scandal would damage an industry that has poured money into their causes.
“I don’t know how much of this betrayal meets the legal standard of treason, but morally, that’s what it amounts to,” Krugman said.
CNN intelligence analyst John Miller has described the alleged operation as a potential espionage windfall for Beijing. Democratic Sens. Elizabeth Warren (MA) and Chris Coons (DE) have demanded that top Trump aides preserve records tied to Nvidia’s China sales, and Republican Sen. Kevin Cramer (ND) has urged Huang to resign.