Trump administration renegotiating 'overly generous' Biden Chips Act grants

WASHINGTON (Reuters) -President Donald Trump's administration is renegotiating some of former President Joe Biden's grants to semiconductor firms that were "overly generous," U.S. Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick said at a hearing on Wednesday.

Biden's Chips Act aimed to coax chipmakers to expand production in the U.S., but some of the awards "just seemed overly generous, and we've been able to renegotiate them," Lutnick told lawmakers on the Senate Appropriations Committee. "Are we renegotiating? Absolutely, for the benefit of the American taxpayer," he added.

Lutnick also addressed concerns that deals like the one announced by Trump to allow the United Arab Emirates to buy advanced artificial intelligence chips from U.S. companies last month could lead to an exodus of AI compute from the U.S.

Lutnick said the administration agrees with the goal that more than 50% of global AI computing capacity should be in America.

(Reporting by Alexandra Alper; Editing by David Gregorio)