Sen. Cotton Urges Commerce Secretary Lutnick to Put Chinese Memory Maker CXMT on the Entity List
Sen. Tom Cotton of Arkansas, the Republican chairman of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, wrote to Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick on November 12 asking the department to place Chinese memory-chip maker ChangXin Memory Technologies (CXMT) on the Bureau of Industry and Security's Entity List, restricting its access to U.S. technology, technical support and chipmaking equipment. The letter was first obtained by CNBC.
In the letter, Cotton wrote that CXMT, one of China's national memory-chip champions, poses a growing risk to U.S. economic prosperity and military superiority. He also said CXMT plays a role in China's military-civil fusion strategy and that its technology could be used against American warfighters. The Entity List is one of Washington's principal export-control tools: once a company is listed, U.S. firms generally cannot supply it or provide U.S. technology without a license.
CXMT is the world's fourth-largest maker of DRAM. Its share of global DRAM revenue rose from 4 percent in the second quarter of 2025 to 10 percent in the second quarter of 2026, according to Counterpoint, and Reuters has reported yields of roughly 20 to 30 percent on its high-bandwidth memory line. CXMT already appears on the Defense Department's Section 1260H list of Chinese military companies, but Kyle Chan, a fellow at the Brookings Institution, notes that designation carries far fewer restrictions on U.S. business dealings than the Entity List. CXMT is challenging its 1260H listing in federal court, saying it has no ties to China's military. In July, two House members also urged the bureau to expedite a formal review of adding CXMT to the Entity List.
The Commerce Department has not announced a decision, and an Entity List designation requires a bureau review. Congress is weighing several bills to tighten chip exports to China further, and the Senate Banking Committee has asked Lutnick and former Nvidia chief executive Jensen Huang to testify at separate hearings in December.
Related: Speaker Johnson: A Consensus Is Forming in Congress to Limit Chip Exports to China
Source: U.S. Senate Select Committee on Intelligence
Published by GSM · USA (original Chinese edition)
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