Sen. Hawley Urges Justice Department to Investigate China-Financed Trucking Company

The senator said evidence shows that TuSimple ‘systematically shared proprietary data’ with Chinese state-linked entities

Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) speaks during a confirmation hearing with the nominee for Secretary of Education, Linda McMahon, on Capitol Hill in Washington on Feb. 13, 2025. Madalina Vasiliu/The Epoch Times

Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) is urging the Department of Justice to open a formal investigation into an autonomous trucking company that was funded by money from a prominent Chinese businessman, alleging that it had passed on sensitive information to communist China.

Hawley, a member of the Senate Judiciary and Homeland Security committees, announced on May 30 that he had sent a letter to Attorney General Pam Bondi expressing his concerns about TuSimple Holdings, which was founded in San Diego in 2015. TuSimple voluntarily delisted itself from the Nasdaq in early 2024 and rebranded as CreateAI late last year.

“Why is some ‘self-driving’ truck company, whose whole business model is about putting American workers OUT of business, sharing tech secrets with China? They should be investigated. Pronto,” Hawley wrote on social media platform X on May 29.

In his letter, Hawley cited reports that TuSimple “systematically shared proprietary data, source code, and autonomous driving technologies with Chinese state-linked entities.” He called the company’s decision “a blatant disregard” of its agreement with the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS) in 2022.

“These reports also revealed communications from TuSimple personnel inside China requesting the shipment of sensitive Nvidia AI chips and detailed records showing ‘deep and longstanding ties’ with Chinese military-affiliated manufacturers,” Hawley wrote.

“To date, TuSimple has not faced serious consequences for sharing American intellectual property with China.”

Nvidia is banned from shipping some of its high-end artificial intelligence (AI) chips to China, following the Biden administration’s export controls issued in 2022 and the subsequent export restriction updates announced in 2023. Last month, the Trump administration announced a new export restriction on Nvidia’s H20 AI chips, which had been the most advanced AI chip that the company could export to China.

Hawley noted that if the reports about TuSimple were accurate, it would mean that the U.S.-based autonomous trucking company funded by money from China had violated U.S. export law, committed a breach of national trust, and possibly hurt U.S. technological leadership.

“The American people deserve to know how and why a supposedly U.S.-based company was allowed to serve as a conduit for the transfer of sensitive innovations to the Chinese Communist Party,” Hawley wrote.

TuSimple co-founder Mo Chen, who is a Canadian citizen residing mostly in China, launched a company called Hydron in 2022 that was incorporated in China, Hong Kong, and Delaware but headquartered in Southern California to develop and manufacture hydrogen-powered trucks equipped with autonomous driving technology.

“Did TuSimple provide protected information to Hydron ... or any other affiliated Chinese entity?” Hawley wrote, referring to one of the issues that Bondi should consider in an investigation.

Another autonomous trucking company, Houston-based Bot Auto, was founded by another TuSimple co-founder, Xiaodi Hou, who is a U.S. citizen. He obtained his Bachelor’s in Engineering from Shanghai Jiao Tong University before completing a doctoral degree at the California Institute of Technology.

Hawley asked Bondi whether the Department of Justice has taken steps to make sure that Bot Auto “does not engage in similar behavior,” considering that the Houston-based company is “staffed with former TuSumple employees and backed by Chinese capital.”

Hou formerly sued Chen for voting control of TuSimple after Chen moved to liquidate the company and transfer its assets to TuSimple China based in China.

In 2017, the Commission on the Theft of American Intellectual Property estimated that the U.S. economy suffers an annual loss of between $225 to $600 billion because of communist China’s IP theft each year.

The Epoch Times contacted CreateAI for comment but didn’t receive a response by publication time.