WASHINGTON, D.C. –– House Committee on Homeland Security Chairman Andrew R. Garbarino (R-NY) and House Select Committee on China Chairman John Moolenaar (R-MI) are continuing their joint investigation into the national security, cybersecurity, and…

WASHINGTON, D.C. –– House Committee on Homeland Security Chairman Andrew R. Garbarino (R-NY) and House Select Committee on China Chairman John Moolenaar (R-MI) are continuing their joint investigation into the national security, cybersecurity, and economic security implications of U.S. companies integrating open-weight artificial intelligence (AI) models developed by the People’s Republic of China (PRC) into consumer platforms, enterprise software, and systems with access to sensitive commercial or personal information. 

In April, the Committees began their investigation with letters to Anysphere and Airbnb. Since then, the Committees have engaged in productive discussions with both companies regarding the technical, commercial, and security considerations surrounding their evaluation and use of PRC-developed open-weight models. As a next step in the investigation, the Chairmen sent a letter to DoorDash this week requesting similar information. Read the full letter here.

Today’s update comes as the PRC has intensified its efforts to close the AI innovation gap with leading U.S. frontier labs through model distillation, intellectual property theft, and other illicit means. On July 22, the Director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy stated that the Chinese AI company Moonshot may have operated a covert platform to conduct large scale distillation against American AI models and trained models using advanced systems that it was not authorized to obtain.

In the letter to DoorDash, the Chairmen write, “[T]he Committees recognize that U.S. companies, from large technology firms to startups, may evaluate and deploy PRC-developed open-weight models because they can provide competitive capabilities, lower costs, greater customization, and alternatives to reliance on a small number of proprietary model providers. Those practical considerations 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. An effective federal approach should therefore scrutinize U.S. companies’ reliance on PRC-developed models and strengthen the availability, security, and competitiveness of American open-weight alternatives, while applying appropriately tailored safeguards in sensitive and high-risk applications. This investigation is intended to establish the factual record necessary to inform that approach.”

The joint investigation is examining the provenance of these models, the data and techniques used to train them, whether their capabilities were advanced through unauthorized distillation from leading U.S. systems, and how they are being repackaged, deployed, or made available to companies in the United States and around the world. As part of that work, the Committees are also examining whether the United States has a sufficient open-weight AI strategy to ensure American companies and cyber defenders are not forced to choose between expensive or restricted U.S. models and cheap, capable PRC-developed alternatives.

Background: 

The House Committee on Homeland Security continues to engage with the private sector on AI through roundtables, briefings, and hearings on the future of cybersecurity and best practices for developing secure AI technology. In May, Anthropic provided Committee Members with one of the first live demonstrations of Mythos given to Congress, allowing Members to see firsthand how advanced AI can find software vulnerabilities. The demonstration reinforced the urgency of ensuring that federal agencies, including our civilian cyber defenders, can responsibly use advanced U.S. models to find and patch vulnerabilities. 

Last week, Members of both Committees participated in a bipartisan Member-level war game to examine AI-enabled cyber threats, critical infrastructure resilience, and the homeland security implications of the PRC obtaining Mythos-level AI capabilities. Rep. Michael McCaul (R-TX), former chairman of the Committee on Homeland Security, led Member participation in the exercise.

In June, the Subcommittee on Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Protection convened a hearing to examine how AI is transforming the cybersecurity landscape and reshaping the resilience of America’s critical infrastructure, as well as policy solutions to secure our networks, strengthen America’s domestic technology base, and ensure the United States maintains its leadership in emerging technologies.

The House Committee on Homeland Security also hosted a bipartisan, closed-door demonstration of “jailbroken” AI with presentations from the Department of Homeland Security’s (DHS) National Counterterrorism Innovation, Technology, and Education Center (NCITE). Their latest findings show a troubling trend: extremists are increasingly turning to “uncensored” or “unrestricted” AI models that remove built‑in safety guardrails. 

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