US House panel advances bill to give Congress authority on AI chip exports

The bill gives Congress more licence to block AI exports to China and other US political adversaries.Published On 21 Jan 2026The United States House of Representatives Foreign Affairs Committee has overwhelmingly voted to advance a bill that would give Congress more power over artificial intelligence chip exports despite pushback from White House AI tsar David Sacks and a social media campaign against the legislation.Representative Brian Mast of Florida, a Republican and the chair of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, introduced the “AI Overwatch Act” in December after US President Donald Trump greenlit shipments of Nvidia’s powerful H200 AI chips to China.Recommended Stories list of 4 itemslist 1 of 4US forces seize a seventh Venezuela-linked oil tankerlist 2 of 4‘Rupture in the world order’: What Carney, world leaders said in Davoslist 3 of 4Can Europe break with Trump? A tale of energy, defence, economic dependencelist 4 of 4EU parliament refers Mercosur free trade deal to bloc’s top courtend of listThe legislation, which still needs to clear the full House and Senate, would give the House Foreign Affairs Committee and the Senate Banking Committee 30 days to review and potentially block licences issued to export advanced AI chips to China and other adversaries.The bill claims that those “countries of concern” also include countries beyond China, such as Russia, Iran, North Korea, Cuba and Venezuela.The bill also requires the US Department of Commerce to provide lawmakers with a full, detailed application that shows that the chips will not be used for military, intelligence or surveillance applications conducted by adversarial nations to the US.One source said the bill’s odds of being passed increased after a coordinated media campaign last week against the bill.“These advanced chips need to fall under the same oversight as any other military-related system,” Mast said at a session on Wednesday before the committee vote. “This is about the future of military warfare.”