President Donald Trump announced Monday that his administration will permit NVIDIA Corp. to export its advanced H200 artificial intelligence (AI) chip to China, a hard pivot from previous export control policies that quickly drew stinging condemnation from Democratic lawmakers and trade experts.
In a post on Truth Social, Trump said he had informed Chinese President Xi Jinping of the decision, which will allow sales to “approved customers” under conditions intended to protect national security. The arrangement requires 25% of sales revenues to be paid to the U.S. government.
“This policy will support American Jobs, strengthen U.S. Manufacturing, and benefit American Taxpayers,” Trump wrote, adding that the same approach would apply to other chipmakers including AMD Inc. and Intel Corp.
The H200, launched in 2023, represents NVIDIA’s most powerful chip outside its latest Blackwell series, which will remain restricted for the Chinese market. According to the Washington, D.C.-based Institute for Progress, the H200 is nearly six times more powerful than the H20, a downgraded chip NVIDIA previously designed specifically for export to China.
NVIDIA said the announcement struck a “thoughtful balance” that would support high-paying American jobs and manufacturing.
The decision represents a dramatic departure from the Biden administration’s approach, which limited American chipmakers to exporting scaled-down versions of their products to the Chinese market. Trump criticized his predecessor’s policy, claiming it had forced American tech companies to spend billions developing downgraded products “nobody wanted.”
Under a previous agreement announced in August, NVIDIA had been cleared to ship the less-powerful H20 chip to China, with the company agreeing to pay the U.S. government 15% of those sales revenues.
Tilly Zhang, a Chinese tech expert at Gavekal Dragonomics, characterized Trump’s move as reflecting both market realities and intensive lobbying by NVIDIA CEO Jensen Huang. She suggested U.S. priorities are shifting from blocking China’s technological advancement toward competing for market share and commercial benefits.
“As blocking China’s tech advancement becomes increasingly unrealistic, gaining more market share and revenue is turning into a higher priority,” Zhang said, noting the AI competition between the two nations is evolving from export controls toward market dynamics that could accelerate innovation.
However, the announcement drew sharp criticism from Democratic lawmakers. Sen. Elizabeth Warren (Mass.) accused the administration of “selling out U.S. security,” pointing to Department of Justice investigations revealing illegal smuggling of advanced chips into China. Warren noted the DOJ had described such chips as “building blocks of AI superiority.”
Chris McGuire, a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations who worked on tech policy in Biden’s White House, warned the decision could undermine American technological leadership. He said loosening export controls would help Chinese AI firms narrow the gap with leading U.S. models and enable Chinese cloud providers to build competitive data centers globally, potentially threatening U.S. dominance in AI infrastructure.
“Over the last few years, there has been considerable debate over whether export controls on NVIDIA’s chips was truly centered on national security concerns or ensuring the United States remains the technological leader in the space. The reality probably rests somewhere in the middle,” national security law expert Larry Ward said. “The great lengths that Chinese companies have taken to get the chips illegally and the number of cases brought by the Justice Department for illegal exports shows how serious this chip war is. It is difficult to see how this move will benefit national security, on the one hand, or technological competitiveness on the other.”
