Besant “The authority to sanction Megaspeed is the Department of Commerce”… Rutnick's public assassination

On the 13th (local time), U.S. Secretary of the Treasury Scott Besant publicly targeted Commerce Secretary Howard Rutnick, saying that the Commerce Department is responsible for sanctions against Megaspeed, a Singaporean company at the center of allegations of former NVIDIA CEO Jensen Huang's "Chinese spy affair."

In an interview with CNBC, a U.S. economic media outlet, Minister Bessant said that several ministries, including the Treasury, Department of Defense, State Department, and Office of the Trade Representative (USTR), have been in favor of placing Megaspeed on the restricted trade list for several months.

He went on to say that the authority to decide on sanctions against Megaspeed lies with the Department of Commerce, adding, “We will have to ask them about their internal procedures.”

This is a statement that publicly revealed the differences of opinion within the Donald Trump administration, and US media such as Axios previously reported that Secretary Besant asked Commerce Secretary Rutnick in the White House Situation Room last week why Megaspeed was not placed on the restricted trade list.

Axios reported that Secretary Rutnick has repeatedly prevented crackdowns on companies suspected of indirectly exporting Nvidia's advanced artificial intelligence (AI) semiconductors to China.

In response to a question regarding the report, Minister Bessant responded, "We do not disclose conversations in the situation room."

Regarding the possibility of NVIDIA's cutting-edge semiconductors being leaked to China through Megaspeed, he said, "I believe there are many leaks within the system," and "we are constantly working to block them."

Minister Besant also pointed out Nvidia's responsibility.

"So far, the issue has been about Jensen Huang's personal shortcomings," he said. "The real question here should be whether Nvidia knew its customers and whether there were thorough efforts within Nvidia to prevent leaks and to avoid selling products to shell companies that clearly acted as a middleman."

He emphasized, “It is important for anyone within the company to take responsibility for that.”

In particular, he pointed to Nvidia's General Counsel Tim Teter, who had previously intervened in the U.S. government's investigation into the suspicions of MegaSpeed's indirect export of Nvidia semiconductors, and criticized him, saying, "Rather than criticizing, we should have supervised more thoroughly."

The two leaders expressed a negative stance on the need to discuss this issue at the US-China summit next week.

He explained, “Why should I bring this up? Since there was a case of violation of regulations, we will definitely take action to prevent something like this from happening again in the future.”

Minister Bessant also emphasized that although China can purchase American semiconductors, it cannot obtain cutting-edge products.

“We have set a red line on the NVIDIA H100 semiconductor,” he said. “As a customer, China can and does buy lower-tech products.”