McCaul Pledges 'Thorough Review' of BIS Export Controls After Finding of US Chips at Chinese Lab

The chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, Michael McCaul, R-Texas, promised a "thorough review of the policies and procedures" at the Commerce Department's Bureau of Industry and Security after the state-run China Academy of Engineering Physics reportedly was able to continue purchasing U.S.-made semiconductors since 2020 despite being on a U.S. export ban list since 1997.

The chips, made by companies such as Intel and NVidia, were acquired from resellers in China, according to a Jan. 29 report by The Wall Street Journal. Some chips were procured as part of completed computer systems and bought by the academy's laboratory studying fluid dynamics. The laboratory was one of the first to be put on the BIS entity list when it was designated for its role in nuclear weapons research.

BIS has been a major focus of the Foreign Affairs Committee. McCaul said of the U.S. technology supporting China's nuclear weapons lab, “Our government doesn’t have time to complain that these problems are tough. We need solutions. That’s why I’ll be conducting a thorough review ... at BIS to ensure export controls are being properly enforced. Time is of the essence.”