US lawmaker warns against H20 chip sales to China, vows US dominance in global AI race

Chairman of Select Committee on the Chinese communist party (SCCCP) John Moolenaar (R-MI) gave a speech at the Krach Institute for Tech Diplomacy discussing a crucial topic: ensuring the security of the technologies that will shape the upcoming century.

"Semiconductors, AI, quantum computing aren't just economic assets. They're the backbone of national security, diplomacy, and global power," asserted Moolenaar, according to the release by SCCCP.

Moolenaar also expressed his disagreement with the recent choice to remove the prohibition on the sale of H20 chips to China.. "The decision to lift the ban was done for a reason I very much agree with. Selling H20s to China further extends U.S. technology as the global standard and provides valuable revenue for U.S. companies that will be used to invest in the next tech generation. However, these are not the only objectives we must achieve. The core objective of all U.S. export control restrictions to China is preventing the PLA from advancing their military capability, in this case AI, through U.S. technology," he continued, as quoted by SCCCP.


"The H20 is a stark improvement over what the Chinese can indigenously produce at scale. When, not if, these chips are diverted to a PLA supercomputer, they will substantially upgrade their ability to run advanced AI models. Additionally, the U.S. must dominate AI software as much as it does hardware. My committee's April 2025 report showed how DeepSeek was able to illegally use access to U.S. models to develop a comparable capability. It was done at a fraction of the price and U.S. chips including the H20 were critical. DeepSeek is now free to use, essentially giving away what took U.S. companies years of research and millions of dollars," Moolenaar said. "If we are to win the AI race, we must be the global standard for both AI hardware and software while ensuring the U.S. military, not the PLA, has the advantage in AI", stated SCCCP release.

Concluding the speech, the Chairman said, "We will not allow China to use American chips to build the arsenal of authoritarianism. But we will ensure the world runs on American AI. That is the dual mission and how the United States will win the global AI future", SCCCP release noted.