John Moolenaar is a US Representative for Michigan's 2nd Congressional District, serving since 2015, and a Republican. He has chaired the House Select Committee on the Strategic Competition between the United States and the Chinese Communist Party (the "Select Committee on China") since January 2024, succeeding Mike Gallagher when Gallagher retired mid-term. He is a senior member of the House Committee on Appropriations. In AI policy he is associated chiefly with US chip-export controls on China and is the namesake of the SCALE Act (SCALE Act — Rep. John Moolenaar (April 2026), April 2026).
Chip export controls and the SCALE Act
Moolenaar's most-cited contribution to AI policy is the export-control framing introduced in the SCALE Act (SCALE Act — Rep. John Moolenaar (April 2026)), which he introduced the week of April 21, 2026 and which would permit US chip exports to China up to 110% of the performance of the best chip China can manufacture domestically at scale. This replaces his earlier "10% cap" framing, under which Chinese aggregate AI compute would be capped at 10% of US capacity, with a capability-relative threshold that rises automatically as China's Huawei — Ascend AI Accelerators and SMIC capabilities improve. The shift from a quantitative cap to a capability-relative test is the focal point in the debate over whether export controls preserve or merely shift the technological frontier (SCALE Act — Rep. John Moolenaar (April 2026); BIS Framework for AI Diffusion — Interim Final Rule (RESCINDED)).
On enforcement, the Select Committee sent multiple letters to the Department of Commerce and the Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS) through 2025 and 2026 pressing for what it described as enforcement gaps in the BIS Framework for AI Diffusion — Interim Final Rule (RESCINDED). The committee was reportedly central to the December 2024 / early-2025 framework that became the SCALE Act framing.
Moolenaar's framing across 2024-2026 has emphasized competition and deterrence more than the decoupling-focused tenure of Mike Gallagher; he tends to present controls as preserving a US technological lead rather than as severing technological links.
After Huawei's May 25, 2026 "Tau Scaling Law" Shanghai unveil of a transistor-density roadmap, Moolenaar's office issued a statement framing the reported roadmap as "exactly why the US cannot afford to be complacent about its lead" (cited in Analysis: Lawmakers, industry pitch frontier AI governance approaches as they await White House moves (Inside AI Policy, May 15 2026)).
Select Committee priorities under Moolenaar's chairmanship
The Select Committee has organized its 2024-2026 work around four areas, all with AI implications:
- Chip export controls. Hearings and letters pressuring BIS, Commerce, and the White House on enforcement of the BIS Framework for AI Diffusion — Interim Final Rule (RESCINDED) (see above).
- TikTok and data flows. An earlier focus pre-dating the SCALE Act work.
- Advanced biotech and AI-enabled biology. Hearings on Chinese AI-driven drug discovery and gene-synthesis capability.
- AI talent flows and outbound investment. The committee has been one of the principal congressional drivers of attention to US AI talent moving to or training Chinese labs.
The committee has operated with a bipartisan tone under Moolenaar, with most major letters and reports co-signed jointly with ranking member Raja Krishnamoorthi (D-IL 08).
A fifth line of inquiry opened in 2026 concerns American companies' commercial adoption of Chinese open-weight models. Jointly with House Committee on Homeland Security Chairman Andrew Garbarino (R-NY), Moolenaar sent letters to Anysphere and Airbnb in April 2026 and to DoorDash on July 31, 2026 seeking information on their use of models developed in the People's Republic of China. The chairmen wrote that the practical advantages of such models "do not eliminate the need for risk-based safeguards or diminish the national security concerns associated with growing dependence on models developed by entities subject to PRC jurisdiction" (Source: homeland.house.gov). The inquiry addresses deployers rather than developers, a different target from the export-control and Entity List instruments the committee has otherwise pursued. See Open-Weight Frontier Models.
Positions in the US-China AI policy debate
Moolenaar's positions relative to other actors:
| Position | Moolenaar | Contrast |
|---|---|---|
| Chip export controls | Performance-relative cap (SCALE Act 110%) | Jake Sullivan / Biden BIS — quantity-based licensing tiers; David Sacks — narrower, more enforcement-skeptical |
| US AI training-talent leaks | Tighter visa controls plus outbound-investment review | Industry / Marc Andreessen — open immigration the priority |
| Frontier-model national-security access | Supportive of Anthropic / OpenAI national-security deployments | David Sacks briefly skeptical of Anthropic post-Mythos |
On chip export controls, Moolenaar serves as a congressional counterpart to executive-branch actors including Jake Sullivan (historically) and David Sacks in the Trump White House, alongside his predecessor Mike Gallagher.
Relationships
- chairs: House Select Committee on the Strategic Competition between the United States and the Chinese Communist Party
- sponsored: SCALE Act — Rep. John Moolenaar (April 2026)
- predecessor: Mike Gallagher (as committee chair)
- co-engaged-with: Raja Krishnamoorthi (committee ranking member)
- regulates: (oversight, not statutory authority) Nvidia & TSMC — AI Compute Infrastructure; Huawei — Ascend AI Accelerators; SMIC
- related: Export Controls (AI); BIS Framework for AI Diffusion — Interim Final Rule (RESCINDED); US-China AI Competition: Different Races, Different Metrics; David Sacks
Sources
- Analysis: Lawmakers, industry pitch frontier AI governance approaches as they await White House moves (Inside AI Policy, May 15 2026) — Moolenaar Huawei response
- House Select Committee on China — public press releases (Source: selectcommitteeontheccp.house.gov)
- Moolenaar congressional biography (Source: moolenaar.house.gov)