U.S. lawmakers are considering how to curb the increasing adoption of Chinese AI models by domestic companies as geopolitical tensions surrounding the adoption of artificial intelligence rise.
AI has emerged as a key rival between the US and China, with both nations vying for dominance in the field.
Chinese models are becoming increasingly popular with US companies because they are closing the gap in performance to American competitors and at the same time are cheaper to use.
In April, the Trump administration accused Chinese companies of waging “industrial-scale campaigns” to rip off U.S. AI systems and said it would explore ways to hold foreign actors accountable. As Reuters reported on Tuesday, Beijing is considering restricting foreign access to China’s leading AI models.
The increasing adoption of AI models developed in China has led to U.S. lawmakers increasingly calling for strategies to combat the trend, including through an ongoing investigation by two U.S. House committees.
“The increasing use of Chinese AI models by U.S. companies raises serious concerns,” a State Department spokesperson told CNBC. These “AI models are designed to advance Beijing’s narrative, censor dissent, and reflect the CCP’s ideology and values.”
A spokesman for the British Embassy of the People’s Republic of China said the country rejects “unfounded accusations and malicious slander against its AI development.” They added: “China’s thriving AI sector is based on self-reliance and strength in science and technology.”
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Increasing acceptance
The House Homeland Security Committee and the House Special Committee on China announced in April that they would jointly investigate the increasing adoption of Chinese-developed AI models. A first step in the investigation was for the chairs of these committees to send letters to Cursor and Airbnb informing them of their “use of or exposure to these risks” from AI developed in China.
“The Chinese Communist Party is no longer just nipping at our heels in artificial intelligence, but is seeking to close the gap in some of the very capabilities that will shape the future of cybersecurity,” Andrew Garbarino, chairman of the U.S. House Homeland Security Committee, told CNBC.
“The recent report that a Chinese open-weight model can compete with leading U.S. models in certain vulnerability detection and cybersecurity tasks is highly alarming,” Garbarino said.
While some government agencies have banned the use of Chinese AI models, including DeepSeek, the adoption of these models by US companies is not prohibited. Tech bosses, including crypto companies CoinbaseBrian Armstrong of , and Flo Crivello of AI startup Lindy have publicly touted the use of models from China to reduce costs.
Cursor, which is being acquired by Elon Musk’s SpaceX for $60 billion, built its Composer 2 model using the Chinese AI model Kimi, developed by Moonshot AI. The company declined to comment on the investigation when contacted by CNBC.
Airbnb told CNBC that its “AI activities are predominantly based on models originating in the United States.” The company added that it uses a “limited number of Chinese-origin models, all of which are open source and operated only by approved U.S. service providers, keeping data and operations separate and protected.”
Approach adoption
The ongoing joint investigation by House committees not only focuses on the rise of Chinese AI models, but also examines whether the US is doing enough to address their rise.
“The committees are also examining whether the United States has a sufficiently open AI strategy to ensure that American companies and cyber defenders are not forced to choose between expensive or limited U.S. models and cheap, powerful alternatives developed in the People’s Republic of China,” a committee official, who asked not to be identified because he was not authorized to discuss the ongoing investigation, told CNBC.
Andy Ogles, chairman of the Subcommittee on Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Protection, has called for a “serious strategy” to ensure that American models are a “real alternative” to those from China.
“If the cheap, powerful and easy option for an AI model is Chinese, the rest of the world will build on it,” Ogles said in June.
“If we do nothing, Chinese models will become the default foundation of the global digital economy, with embedded censorship, uncertain security and capabilities distilled from our own laboratories with no security guardrails removed,” he added.
The administration could consider using federal procurement bans, which would include preventing government agencies and private companies that serve the U.S. government from using Chinese AI models. Kyle Chan, a fellow at the John L. Thornton China Center at the Brookings think tank, told CNBC.
“Ultimately, however, it is impossible to ban China’s open source AI models because their model weights are freely available on the Internet,” Chan added. “This could raise First Amendment issues.”
While the Trump administration is “clearly concerned” about the risks posed by American companies adopting Chinese AI models, it will be difficult to restrict their use, Daniel Remler, senior fellow for technology and national security at the think tank Center for a New American Security (CNAS), told CNBC.
Remler said that in addition to potential First Amendment protections, the administration may be concerned that “actions against the Chinese models could harm startups that use these models or weaken support for open models in general.”
One approach could be procurement requirements that prevent companies that want to do business with the government from using Chinese AI models, he added. Another option could be to share insights about risks and vulnerabilities associated with Chinese AI models with U.S. companies.
“Nevertheless, I expect both the executive branch and Congress to express interest in not seeing U.S. companies adopt these models,” Remler said.
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https://www.cnbc.com/2026/07/08/chinese-ai-models-probe-us-lawmakers.html
