Donald Trump tried until the very last moment to prevent Jensen Huang from being removed from Nvidia, despite warnings from U.S. intelligence agencies about his relationship with a woman suspected of spying for China. According to The New York Times, the U.S. president called Huang on Tuesday (Nov. 10), urging him to fight to keep his job. Two days later, however, the company announced his resignation as CEO, following revelations about two extramarital affairs.
According to The New York Times, citing two people briefed on the conversation, Trump personally intervened on behalf of Huang, who had become a close ally and influential advisor on artificial intelligence matters.
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The U.S. president continued to support him even after intelligence agencies concluded that he was involved with Alice Huang, a Chinese citizen who was allegedly recruited by China’s Ministry of State Security.
The first warning to Trump came in late 2025, and the second in the spring of 2026. Despite this, he took no action and even included the head of Nvidia in the delegation that accompanied him to China in May.
Even after the scandal broke, the president publicly expressed his support, calling Huang a “legend” on Thursday.
A spokesperson for the former Nvidia CEO declined to comment on the report, while the White House and Trump did not respond to requests for details about the content of the phone call.
Why Trump Ignored the Warnings
According to his aides, the U.S. president viewed the matter more as a breach-of-trust scandal than as a potential threat to national security.
Intelligence officials had expressed concerns about Huang’s close ties to Chinese businesspeople and local officials, considering him, at best, naive and careless. Some questioned whether he was unaware of Alice Huang’s possible ties to Chinese espionage.
Trump, however, viewed the founder of Nvidia as a modern-day Henry Ford and considered his company too important for the U.S. economy.
His concern centered on the potential impact of Huang’s departure on Wall Street. When he learned that the board of directors was considering replacing him, he asked his colleagues how the markets would react, fearing a sharp drop in the stock price.
Nvidia, one of the world’s largest companies by market capitalization, was a key pillar of his strategy for U.S. dominance in artificial intelligence and technological competition with China.
From an unknown Nvidia to a close relationship with the White House
The relationship between the two men has essentially developed over the past two years. During Trump’s first term, Huang had no significant presence in Washington; he was not involved in political fundraising or lobbying, and he did not even attend the president’s second inauguration.
The restrictions on exports of advanced chips imposed by the Biden administration had forced him to pay closer attention to U.S. politics, though he was not as active as other tech executives.
Trump himself has described his initial reaction upon hearing the businessman’s name: “Who the hell is that? What’s his name?” When he was told that he was the head of Nvidia, he asked, “What the hell is Nvidia?”
By the end of 2024, he had realized that the company controlled at least 80% of the market for processors used to train advanced artificial intelligence models.
In April 2025, Huang and his wife, Laurie, attended a dinner at Mar-a-Lago with Trump and donors from the tech and cryptocurrency sectors. The meeting was a turning point.
“You’re taking over the world, Jensen,” the president later told him.
Huang had announced plans to invest up to $500 billion in artificial intelligence infrastructure in the U.S., reinforcing Trump’s vision for the reindustrialization of the American economy.
In contrast to the unfulfilled expectations of his first term regarding the revival of the coal and steel industries, Trump now saw data centers, their energy needs, and artificial intelligence as a new opportunity for growth and jobs.
Huang cultivated this relationship with public praise. “America’s unique advantage, which no other country could have, is President Trump,” he said in July 2025.
He had also accompanied the president to the Persian Gulf in May of that same year, when agreements were announced to sell Nvidia processors to Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.
The chip deals with China and the conflict with MAGA
Huang’s influence was most evident in the policy regarding exports of advanced processors to China.
The businessman argued that Nvidia should make its products widely available so that global artificial intelligence would be based on American—rather than Chinese—technology.
With the support of David Sacks, a White House advisor on artificial intelligence and cryptocurrencies, he convinced Trump to allow certain exports to China, despite opposition from MAGA officials, such as Steve Bannon, who were calling for a complete ban.
Other powerful figures in the tech industry also sided with Huang, including the heads of OpenAI, Meta, and SpaceX.
The agreement stipulated that the U.S. government would initially collect 15% of the revenue from specific chip sales to China, a percentage that was later raised to 25%.
The arrangement sparked legal challenges and warnings that economic interests were taking precedence over national security, while government officials privately expressed surprise at Huang’s influence over the president.
China, Taiwan, and Trump’s Real Priorities
According to The New York Times, Trump’s stance on the Huang case is consistent with his broader approach toward Beijing.
Although during his 2016 campaign he had accused China of “raping” the U.S. economy, his confrontation with Beijing focused primarily on trade, where he often preferred deals with Xi Jinping to a protracted conflict.
His stance on human rights was similar. When asked in 2020 why he did not impose sanctions over the mass detention of Uyghurs in Xinjiang, he replied, “We were in the middle of a major trade deal.”
His associates also report that he has privately questioned the need for U.S. involvement in a war over Taiwan. In fact, he reportedly used a teaspoon to illustrate the island’s small size, telling his dinner companions, “This is Taiwan.”
Huang’s resignation, despite Trump’s personal intervention, brought an end to an alliance that had become particularly important to the White House’s economic and technological strategy, while also highlighting the contradictions between the administration’s business priorities and the warnings from national security agencies.
