Sen. Cramer Questions Whether Commerce Secretary Defied Trump on Chip Sales to China

Sen. Kevin Cramer (R-ND) said Friday he believes officials across the administration largely relied on assurances from Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang that nothing improper was occurring in chip sales to China, even as concerns mounted within the government over the matter.

Speaking on Fox News Channel’s “The Story,” Cramer said he has not personally received a briefing on the issue, though he suggested other committees may have been informed.

“I’ve never received a briefing on this specific topic, not that we’d have to be. Maybe the Intelligence Committee was, maybe Foreign Relations, I don’t know. But, clearly, people within the administration were, from the timeline that we’ve seen and the points that you’re making right now, that are quite public, about Secretary Rubio’s concerns, the intelligence community’s concerns, and I suspect that people were just taking Mr. Huang’s word for it that there was nothing nefarious going on. But that doesn’t change the fact that there was a prohibition on it,” Cramer said.

Cramer said he believes President Trump has legitimate discretion over such sales, but raised a sharper question about whether the Commerce Department acted on its own.

“Now, the president, rightfully, has some flexibility, and the administration in all of this. What remains most concerning to me, however, is, was the secretary of Commerce going against the wishes of the president of the United States? They’re going to have to flesh that out,” he said.

Cramer noted that lawmakers have been raising alarms about chip sales to China for more than a year.

“But, way back, at least over a year ago, probably, we were already warning, even as a committee, warning about the issue of sales to China. Again, there are areas, Martha, where China has caught up to us. There are some areas, perhaps, where they’ve exceeded our ability. But they’re nowhere near our capability with AI chips. And to give them that advantage, at our cost, at our expense, yes, a lot of people have gotten wealthy selling to China, too, but to our national security detriment, it’s just so galling to me, and I’m surprised it took this long for more — for people to step up,” Cramer said.