Chris McGuire is a senior fellow for China and emerging technologies at the Council on Foreign Relations. He is a leading expert in U.S.-China technology competition, export controls and other technology protection policies, artificial intelligence, and semiconductors.

McGuire served as a career government official for over a decade, including as the deputy senior director for technology and national security at the National Security Council (NSC), where he served from 2022 to 2024. In that capacity, he coordinated all government policies related to technology competition with China, artificial intelligence, and semiconductors, and helped manage the NSC directorate focused on all critical and emerging technologies. During his tenure at the NSC, McGuire crafted and implemented the Biden administration’s technology protection strategy, including all semiconductor and dual-use technology export controls, the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States, outbound investment policy, and other technology regulations.

McGuire has also served as a senior advisor in the State Department and the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, at the Department of Defense as a special assistant to the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and as director for research and analysis on the National Security Commission on Artificial Intelligence. He has also served as the State Department’s lead subject matter expert on U.S.-Russia nuclear weapons and arms control policy. Before entering government, McGuire worked at McKinsey & Company in New York.

McGuire holds a bachelor’s degree from Pomona College and a master’s degree in public policy from Harvard Kennedy School.