Washington Is Taking Control of AI

The fallout of the Jensen affair continues. And its blast radius is certainly not limited to NVIDIA or even AI. It's clear that as the lame duck session of Congress begins, this is being seen as a key inflection point to make some key shifts in geopolitical priorities. The AI Daily Brief is a daily podcast and video about the most important news and discussions in AI. Alright, friends. Quick announcements before we dive in. First of all, thank you to today's sponsors, KPMG, robots and pencils, c data, and Blitzy. To get an ad free version of the show, go to patreon.com/aidailybrief, or you can subscribe on Apple Podcasts. And lastly, one update on the new show, how we got here. You might have heard me mention how every week, in addition to the main episode, which is the full length deep dive on some important phenomenon, I will also be doing a counterpoint episode. And the idea of the counterpoints are pretty simple, to create a space for people to disagree or point out things where they feel like I haven't gone far enough. It's a way for people to come into the conversation. I've just posted the first counterpoints for How Tech Lost America, and I'm really excited to see what you think. So go look up How We Got Here with NLW, and send me some notes about what you think. Welcome back to the Jensen Daily Brief. We are continuing to examine the seismic reverberations in the wake of Jensen Huang's resignation from NVIDIA. Although, as we'll discuss today, calling it a resignation, I think, doesn't quite do justice to exactly what has happened. Hold aside, all of the more speculative theories about whether there was some coordinated campaign behind this and the timing of it and all that stuff that was part of the show yesterday, even without describing any strong intent or devious machinations in that way, this still feels like the opening salvo of a very new period in Washington where the Democrats are starting to assert their power, both in terms of their foreign policy as well as in terms of their desire to bring powerful private market actors to heel, and where the China hawks are increasingly ascendant. It looks, in other words, in some ways, like Washington fired Jensen, which does not mean that he will no longer have any dealings with Washington. Following Huang's resignation on Thursday morning, chairman John Moulinar released a statement on behalf of the house select committee on China. It stated, Jensen Huang's firing from the company he founded is an unfortunate end that could have been avoided. It is in our national interest for NVIDIA and our other AI champions to succeed, but American companies should never jeopardize our nation's security by giving Chinese companies access to their most advanced chips. NVIDIA must now change its corporate practices and appoint leadership that makes national security its top priority. In Congress, we must act …