Commerce chief seeks industry help to prevent China from getting US chips

By David Shepardson

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick said Tuesday the Trump administration is seeking help from companies and foreign governments to prevent China from getting U.S. chips, and reiterated his belief Chinese AI company DeepSeek improperly used American chips.

"People took our chips and redirected them to China for money," Lutnick said at a Bureau of Industry and Security conference. "Sometimes it's not that much money, and sometimes it's a lot of money, but they're seeking to destroy our way of life by assisting those who are against it."

Lutnick added that the Trump administration plans to try to bring export controls into trade deals "so that countries decide are they aligned with America and freedom and liberty and the Western way of life, or are they so hooked to making a little more money or buying something a little more cheaply that they would sell their soul, because that's what you're doing, you'd be selling your soul to those who seek us harm."

Lutnick warned that if the United States "lost Taiwan" and access to Taiwanese chips "and those chips didn't come -- couldn't make a car."

Lutnick also talked about Trump's effort to boost U.S. production of aluminum, steel, semiconductor chips and other goods. "We need to build drones and we need to protect our drones," Lutnick said. "We need to build data centers."

(Reporting by David Shepardson; Editing by Chizu Nomiyama)