Here's a story about how money and policy allegedly intersect in Washington. Senator Chris Murphy of Connecticut is accusing Nvidia Corp. (NVDA) of essentially paying President Donald Trump to ease restrictions on selling cutting-edge chips to China. And he's not being subtle about it.

The Corruption Allegation

Murphy laid it out Sunday on X: "I want to tell you how the corruption works in this White House, give you a specific example and how it hurts our national security." He pointed directly at Jensen Huang, Nvidia's CEO, claiming the chipmaker "wrote huge checks" to Trump's personal projects after the ban on selling advanced chips to China was costing the company billions.

The background is straightforward enough. U.S. export rules have historically prevented Nvidia from shipping its most powerful chips to China. The goal was keeping Beijing from making major advances in artificial intelligence technology. Standard national security stuff.

"But the CEO of NVIDIA figured out how you can change Trump's mind, send him money. And so that's what he did," Murphy said.

Neither the White House nor Nvidia immediately responded to requests for comment.

Policy Shifts And Political Backlash

The controversy intensified after the Trump administration approved Nvidia's H200 AI chip for sale to China earlier this month. Senator Elizabeth Warren jumped in, accusing the administration of favoring corporate interests and suggesting high-level access drove the decision. Nvidia pushed back, noting that sales still required U.S. licenses and represented only a small fraction of its domestic computing power.

Last week brought another development: the administration announced it would delay tariffs on Chinese semiconductors until 2027, despite launching a Section 301 investigation into China's trade practices. The U.S. Trade Representative said China's actions had hurt American companies, workers, and the broader economy.

Former UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunak weighed in too, criticizing the H200 approval. He noted the chip is significantly more powerful than anything China could previously import and could help Beijing close the gap with the West in AI development.

Representative Sydney Kamlager-Dove of California echoed the concerns on X, warning that allowing Nvidia to sell H200 chips to China could accelerate Chinese AI progress. She called Trump "the biggest threat to U.S. global leadership."

The whole situation raises questions about where national security priorities end and commercial interests begin. Nvidia was losing billions under the export restrictions. Now those restrictions have eased. Whether money changed hands to make that happen is the question Murphy wants answered.