China Select Committee Urges More Funding for BIS
The House Select Committee on China said in a new report that the Bureau of Industry and Security should receive additional funding to improve its export control capabilities amid a growing workload.
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BIS needs more money "to expand export control analysis, techniques, and enforcement," the committee wrote in the report, released April 16. "BIS’s budget, and therefore its personnel and analytic capabilities, have not kept pace with the increase in export control requirements."
A technology policy expert said in October that while BIS has implemented significant new export controls aimed at China and Russia since 2022, its funding has declined after accounting for inflation (see 2411010014). However, the committee’s position seems at odds with the Trump administration, which plans to reduce BIS’s funding by 10.5% to $171 million during FY 2025 as part of a broader cut to national security programs (see 2503260050 and 2503270005).
The committee made its recommendation in response to recent advances by Chinese artificial intelligence startup DeepSeek. The panel alleges that DeepSeek may have obtained tens of thousands of restricted American chips despite U.S. export controls (see 2504160039).
The report’s other recommendations include expanding export controls to cover additional chips, such as Nvidia’s H20. Nvidia disclosed April 15 that it was recently told by the U.S. government that it must begin obtaining licenses to export the H20 to China (see 2504160026).
The report also calls for creating a program to encourage whistleblowers to report export control violations. Two senators introduced a bill this month that would set up such a program (see 2504140012).
Other recommendations include expanding export controls on chipmaking equipment in cooperation with allies; imposing remote access controls on certain data centers, compute clusters and models; scrutinizing chip exports to jurisdictions with a high risk of diversion to China, such as Singapore; considering requiring chipmakers and chipmaking equipment firms to track end-users of appropriate chips and equipment; and improving the cybersecurity of AI systems.