H.R. 8306 — SCALE Act

This section declares it to be the policy of the United States to—(1) lead in the global diffusion of artificial intelligence (AI) hardware and software; (2) shape international markets so that foreign adversaries remain reliant on U.S. and allied supply chains for AI hardware and software; (3) pursue export promotion and export control agendas that enable the diffusion of U.S. AI hardware and software and enduring U.S. leadership in advanced AI; (4) ensure that the United States and its allies consistently apply export restrictions to meet national security objectives and prevent backfill among allied and partner nations; (5) limit the ability of adversaries to indigenize their own AI hardware production efforts, including by crowding out their domestic markets with U.S. AI hardware; (6) provide business stability in export controls through a systematic and repeatable annual process that assesses an entity of concern's indigenous capability to produce AI hardware and sets export control thresholds accordingly; and (7) prevent any foreign adversary from accumulating, through any combination of indigenous production, import, or third-party access, a quantity of AI hardware that approaches parity with the aggregate AI hardware capacity of the United States.

This section directs the Secretary of Commerce and the Director of National Intelligence, in coordination with other agencies as necessary, to establish and publicly release objective performance metrics for AI hardware of entities of concern within 180 days of enactment, assessing indigenous production capabilities, aggregate production relative to demand, and aggregate amounts located in countries of concern or owned/controlled by such entities (with metrics including total processing power, interconnect bandwidth, and memory capacity bandwidth). Within 90 days after each metrics update, the Secretary and Director must submit to the appropriate congressional committees a report assessing AI hardware quantity and quality in each country of concern, including breakdowns by installation location, ownership, remote access, country of origin (based on the designer's domicile), and comparisons to U.S. hardware as a percentage of U.S. totals. The section further requires the Secretary to adopt an AI hardware export control policy—including for remote access—to entities of concern, setting an annual upper export limit (implemented via a policy of license denial) not exceeding 110% of the performance of the most capable indigenously produced item in sustained serial production meeting at least 25% of entities of concern's aggregate demand (or a full denial policy if no such item exists), with limits non-decreasing absent a national security justification; licenses are required for exports exceeding metrics thresholds.

This section provides rules of construction stating that nothing in the Act may be construed to direct the Secretary to (1) decontrol or reduce export control thresholds based on assessment findings or (2) approve licenses for sales of AI hardware or software.

This section defines terms used in the Act, including (1) "AI hardware" as integrated circuits, computers, electronic assemblies, or other items classified under Export Control Classification Numbers 3A090 or 4A090 (or related ".z" suffix items) on the Commerce Control List, or as otherwise designated by the Secretary of Commerce; (2) "country of concern" as China (including Hong Kong and Macau), Cuba, Iran, North Korea, Russia, or other countries in Country Group D:5 (as of January 1, 2026) or designated by the Secretary of State; (3) "entity of concern" as any entity organized under the laws of, principally located in, owned or controlled more than 10% by persons from, or acting on behalf of the government of a country of concern; (4) "indigenous production" of AI hardware as that physically fabricated in China and designed by an entity of concern (excluding such designs fabricated outside countries of concern); and (5) others such as "aggregate estimated amount of AI hardware," "remote access," "Director" (of National Intelligence), "Secretary" (of Commerce), and "appropriate congressional committees."