Warren Demands Commerce Explain UAE Chip Access After Trump Crypto Investment

Warren wants Lutnick to account for why the UAE got license-free access to advanced AI chips months after Gulf money reportedly flowed into the Trump family’s crypto venture.

Senator Elizabeth Warren pressed Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick on Wednesday to explain why his department rolled back export controls and gave the United Arab Emirates license-free access to sensitive American technology, including advanced AI chips. In her letter, the Massachusetts Democrat questioned whether the decision was tied to a reported half-billion-dollar UAE investment in World Liberty Financial, the crypto venture co-founded by President Donald Trump and his sons.

Commerce’s Bureau of Industry and Security added the UAE to Country Group A:5 last month, a designation that lets exporters ship certain controlled items without a license and that has historically been reserved for partners such as the United Kingdom and Australia. Warren wrote that the UAE is the only country in that tier belonging to none of the multilateral export control regimes, including the Nuclear Suppliers Group, the Missile Technology Control Regime, the Australia Group, and the Wassenaar Arrangement, and that it has never sought to join one.

This story is an excerpt from the Unchained Daily newsletter.

UAE entities linked to Sheikh Tahnoon bin Zayed Al Nahyan, the country’s top national security official, reportedly invested in World Liberty Financial and took board seats in 2025. Tahnoon subsequently sought approvals to import advanced AI chips in meetings with U.S. officials, and G42, the AI company he chairs, now has license-free access.

Warren also cited reporting that career Commerce staff recommended against rolling back export restrictions on the UAE and were overruled, and that U.S. intelligence intercepted communications indicating China intended to use its relationship with G42 to obtain American technology and AI algorithms. She pointed to the UAE’s record as a transshipment hub for controlled technology bound for China and Iran, and said experts have called the rollback unjustifiable on either security or economic grounds. Her seven questions ask what risk analysis Commerce performed, whether Energy, Defense, and State were consulted, whether any agency objected, and whether BIS plans to add more non-member countries to A:5.

Five Senate Democrats, Warren among them, demanded hearings in June over the same reported UAE stake in World Liberty Financial, which the Wall Street Journal described as a 49% interest. The group renewed the demand last month after disclosures showed $1.4 billion in crypto earnings tied to Trump, including roughly $594 million from World Liberty and nearly $197 million from a stablecoin venture connected to Tahnoon.

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