Nvidia scandal draws in Commerce Secretary Lutnick, who reportedly agrees to testify about China chip sales

NEW: Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick reportedly agrees to testify before the Senate Banking Committee over China chip sales, as the Nvidia scandal around Jensen Huang's affair with an alleged Chinese spy widens. $NVDA

The Nvidia scandal has reached the Commerce Secretary. Howard Lutnick has agreed to testify before the Senate Banking Committee about how advanced AI chips ended up flowing toward China on his watch.

Chairman Tim Scott sent letters on Thursday evening, Jensen Huang testifies December 3rd, Lutnick on December 10th. Lutnick's spokesperson says he's appearing voluntarily, which tells you he'd rather walk in than be dragged.

The pressure is bipartisan. Senator Jim Banks says Lutnick appears to have used loopholes to let some of these chip sales happen. Elizabeth Warren, who takes over the committee in January, is demanding he explain why export control loopholes were never closed, and she's already ordered every document on Nvidia's China exports preserved.

Remember, this all traces back to Huang's affair with an executive at Megaspeed, a Singapore firm that bought over 4.8 billion dollars of Nvidia chips in two years. What started as a CEO's personal disgrace is now a question about whether the US government was guarding its own technology at all.

This is Sara White, reporting for HIT.