{"slug": "key-republican-urges-us-to-stop-any-advanced-chips-from-reaching-sanctioned", "title": "Key Republican urges US to stop any advanced chips from reaching sanctioned Chinese firms", "summary": "Republican Congressman John Moolenaar, chair of the House Select Committee on China, urged the Trump administration to enforce a Biden-era rule requiring chip manufacturers to scrutinize advanced chip orders to prevent them from reaching sanctioned Chinese firms, warning that failure to do so risks another export control failure like the Sophgo-TSMC-Huawei incident. In a letter dated Thursday to Commerce Department export controls chief Jeffrey Kessler, Moolenaar called the rule 'a critical step in preventing [China] from accessing high-end U.S. chips and preserving America's technological edge.'", "body_md": "By Alexandra Alper\n\nWASHINGTON, Aug 10 (Reuters) - Republican Congressman John Moolenaar, who leads the House Select Committee on China, called on the Trump administration to make sure chip manufacturers don't send advanced logic chips to untrusted Chinese firms.\n\nIn January 2025, the Biden administration unveiled a new rule requiring chip manufacturers to scrutinize orders of advanced chips from companies that could be serving as a front for untrusted firms from China and other countries.\n\nThe rule was a response to revelations that Chinese chip designer Sophgo had chips manufactured at TSMC that were later discovered inside AI processors marketed by Huawei. Huawei has been heavily sanctioned by the United States.\n\nSoon after President Donald Trump took office, though, his administration announced it did not plan to enforce another Biden-era chip regulation referenced in the manufacturer rule, fueling uncertainty about the enforcement of that measure.\n\nIn a letter dated Thursday, Moolenaar described the measure as \"a critical step in preventing [China] from accessing high-end U.S. chips and preserving America's technological edge,\" urging the Commerce Department to enforce it.\n\nThe chip manufacturer rule was created \"to close the loophole that Huawei and Sophgo exploited,\" Moolenaar wrote in the letter, sent to Jeffrey Kessler, who oversees export controls at the Commerce Department.\n\nIf chip factories like TSMC, the world's largest, determine that their chips are not subject to the rules, \"it would dramatically increase the risk of another SophGo-like export control failure,\" Moolenaar said.\n\nCommerce, Huawei, Sophgo and TSMC did not respond to requests for comment.\n\nThe letter, not previously reported, is a sign of increasing congressional concern, even among Republicans, about the Trump administration's more lenient approach to advanced chips reaching Chinese shores.\n\nIn June, Republican Senator Jim Banks co-wrote a letter urging Trump's administration to tighten rules on chip contract manufacturers to prevent them from making advanced AI chips for overseas units of Chinese companies.\n\nRepublican Representative Bill Huizenga sharply criticized Kessler over similar concerns last month, while a decision by the Trump administration to allow Nvidia to sell advanced AI chips to China has drawn fire from both parties.\n\n(Reporting by Alexandra Alper; Editing by Tom Hogue)", "url": "https://wpnews.pro/news/key-republican-urges-us-to-stop-any-advanced-chips-from-reaching-sanctioned", "canonical_source": "https://ca.finance.yahoo.com/news/key-republican-urges-us-stop-100512572.html", "published_at": "2026-08-10 10:05:12+00:00", "updated_at": "2026-08-10 10:38:00.539713+00:00", "lang": "en", "topics": ["ai-chips", "ai-policy"], "entities": ["John Moolenaar", "House Select Committee on China", "Trump administration", "Biden administration", "Sophgo", "TSMC", "Huawei", "Jeffrey Kessler"], "alternates": {"html": "https://wpnews.pro/news/key-republican-urges-us-to-stop-any-advanced-chips-from-reaching-sanctioned", "markdown": "https://wpnews.pro/news/key-republican-urges-us-to-stop-any-advanced-chips-from-reaching-sanctioned.md", "text": "https://wpnews.pro/news/key-republican-urges-us-to-stop-any-advanced-chips-from-reaching-sanctioned.txt", "jsonld": "https://wpnews.pro/news/key-republican-urges-us-to-stop-any-advanced-chips-from-reaching-sanctioned.jsonld"}}