Re:Jensen Huang Said to Have Had Relationship with Nvidia Ex...
by mrandish on Thursday November 12, 2026 @02:30AM
(#50464121)
> I'm fairly convinced this is...
Reporting by both NYT and WSJ has said there have been two opposing factions in the White House on China/AI policy since Trump was elected. The Model Hawks want to Keep America Strong by slowing China's progress in advanced AI models. They think the best way to do that is by stopping US advanced AI hardware going to China (as much as we can).
The Hardware Hawks wants to Keep America Strong by slowing the development of AI's homegrown advanced AI hardware industry. They think the best way to do that is by ONLY selling US advanced AI hardware to China that's slightly more powerful than what China could make on their own now.
Trump vacillates between the two factions (sometimes daily), as indicated by banning the sale of certain somewhat advanced chips, then later reversing that ban. The argument to reverse the ban was because before any ban NVidia had >90% of China's domestic market and after a couple years of ban was down to ~50%, with the difference funding the development of China's AI hardware industry.
I think both factions actually have valid points and don't know which would be better. However, to your point about the reason for these leaks of >6 month-old intelligence reports now - it's that Jensen (and NVidia) have always been in the Keep America Strong by slowing China's domestic hardware industry. If China's domestic AI hardware companies are Mice, NVidia is the Cat saying, "I was keeping your mouse problem under 10% until you locked me out and now it's 50%" Let me back in and I'll get it under control again.
Jensen has developed a pretty good relationship with Trump and is able to sometimes sway his opinion. Whether this is good or bad depends on which kind of Hawk you are. For example, Jensen was invited to go on Trump's first China trip and the Model Hawks were not happy. On Trump's second trip, the Model Hawks managed to keep Jensen from being invited and the Hardware Hawks were not happy. Air Force One left Washington without Jensen, but then stopped in Alaska and picked up Jensen - which made the Model Hawks crazy. The Model Hawks made sure the intelligence report about Alice being a suspected asset for Chinese intelligence was included in briefing report sent to Trump back in May. But Trump it didn't get Trump to stop listening to Jensen sometimes (Trump today claimed he "doesn't remember seeing it, or if he did see it, it didn't make a big impression on him").
So who benefits by these old reports about Alice from May leaking now and blowing up all over the news? BTW, Jensen and NVidia have consistently been Hardware Hawks since long before Jensen met Alice in March 2024. Arguably, any NVidia CEO has a fiduciary duty to shareholders to be a law-abiding Hardware Hawk.
Also the WSJ has reported that Chinese intelligence first developed Alice into an asset because of her relationship with Jensen. Because export controls were bad for her data center company, Alice was obviously already on the Hardware Hawk side before being an info source for Chinese intelligence. The under-reported story (dig a little on WSJ) is that after nearly two years of Commerce and Justice Dept investigating Megaspeed, the US govt still hasn't put Megaspeed on the blocked Entity List (which they can do anytime without explanation). No one knows why, but congress is starting to ask about it. BUT, strangely, NVidia voluntarily placed Megaspeed on their own blocked list in June 2025 and hasn't sold any new GPUs to Megaspeed since then (they did sell a few repair parts and replacement components to support previous sales). So... "Good Guy NVidia?" Not really, these export controls have the same severe penalties as selling cruise missiles and it's a 'strict liability' regulation on suppliers. That means if the supplier "knew, or should have known" that GPUs were being diverted, they would be guilty - and that's potentially serious jail time (in decades) for every individual employee who knew and personal fines up to $1M per card. So... yeah, Alice banging Jensen didn't stop Megaspeed getting cut-off just over a year after she met him.
Reporting by both NYT and WSJ has said there have been two opposing factions in the White House on China/AI policy since Trump was elected. The Model Hawks want to Keep America Strong by slowing China's progress in advanced AI models. They think the best way to do that is by stopping US advanced AI hardware going to China (as much as we can).
The Hardware Hawks wants to Keep America Strong by slowing the development of AI's homegrown advanced AI hardware industry. They think the best way to do that is by ONLY selling US advanced AI hardware to China that's slightly more powerful than what China could make on their own now.
Trump vacillates between the two factions (sometimes daily), as indicated by banning the sale of certain somewhat advanced chips, then later reversing that ban. The argument to reverse the ban was because before any ban NVidia had >90% of China's domestic market and after a couple years of ban was down to ~50%, with the difference funding the development of China's AI hardware industry.
I think both factions actually have valid points and don't know which would be better. However, to your point about the reason for these leaks of >6 month-old intelligence reports now - it's that Jensen (and NVidia) have always been in the Keep America Strong by slowing China's domestic hardware industry. If China's domestic AI hardware companies are Mice, NVidia is the Cat saying, "I was keeping your mouse problem under 10% until you locked me out and now it's 50%" Let me back in and I'll get it under control again.
Jensen has developed a pretty good relationship with Trump and is able to sometimes sway his opinion. Whether this is good or bad depends on which kind of Hawk you are. For example, Jensen was invited to go on Trump's first China trip and the Model Hawks were not happy. On Trump's second trip, the Model Hawks managed to keep Jensen from being invited and the Hardware Hawks were not happy. Air Force One left Washington without Jensen, but then stopped in Alaska and picked up Jensen - which made the Model Hawks crazy. The Model Hawks made sure the intelligence report about Alice being a suspected asset for Chinese intelligence was included in briefing report sent to Trump back in May. But Trump it didn't get Trump to stop listening to Jensen sometimes (Trump today claimed he "doesn't remember seeing it, or if he did see it, it didn't make a big impression on him").
So who benefits by these old reports about Alice from May leaking now and blowing up all over the news? BTW, Jensen and NVidia have consistently been Hardware Hawks since long before Jensen met Alice in March 2024. Arguably, any NVidia CEO has a fiduciary duty to shareholders to be a law-abiding Hardware Hawk.
Also the WSJ has reported that Chinese intelligence first developed Alice into an asset because of her relationship with Jensen. Because export controls were bad for her data center company, Alice was obviously already on the Hardware Hawk side before being an info source for Chinese intelligence. The under-reported story (dig a little on WSJ) is that after nearly two years of Commerce and Justice Dept investigating Megaspeed, the US govt still hasn't put Megaspeed on the blocked Entity List (which they can do anytime without explanation). No one knows why, but congress is starting to ask about it. BUT, strangely, NVidia voluntarily placed Megaspeed on their own blocked list in June 2025 and hasn't sold any new GPUs to Megaspeed since then (they did sell a few repair parts and replacement components to support previous sales). So... "Good Guy NVidia?" Not really, these export controls have the same severe penalties as selling cruise missiles and it's a 'strict liability' regulation on suppliers. That means if the supplier "knew, or should have known" that GPUs were being diverted, they would be guilty - and that's potentially serious jail time (in decades) for every individual employee who knew and personal fines up to $1M per card. So... yeah, Alice banging Jensen didn't stop Megaspeed getting cut-off just over a year after she met him.