← Videos · Economy, Tariffs & Trade

Lutnick and Kratsios Announce a Consensus G20 Innovation Ministerial Statement in Chapel Hill, Sep. 2, 2026

September 2, 2026 · CNBC Television · 0:29:26

Embedded from the source channel — never re-uploaded. Watch on YouTube

What happened

Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick and White House Office of Science and Technology Policy Director Michael Kratsios held a press conference on September 2, 2026, on day two of the G20 Innovation Ministerial in Chapel Hill, North Carolina, carried by CNBC Television. Lutnick announced that the ministers had reached consensus on the G20 innovation ministerial statement: “We have reached consensus on our G20 innovation ministerial statement. That means we had all 20 countries agree, and it was an enormous amount of work,” as he put it, thanking the ministers, their delegations and their staffs. The agreement, as he described it, reflects a shared commitment to advancing innovation, investment and economic growth across the member economies, framed against 250 years of American invention and ambition.

Kratsios, who co-led the conference with Lutnick, told reporters the administration was “very proud of what we’re able to accomplish and get signed,” noting that coming to a consensus with 20 nations of the G20 “is not a simple matter” and that the ministerial was an opportunity for all G20 nations to express how important innovation is, as he stated it. The ministerial’s second day featured the technology guests CNBC’s description listed — Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang, Anthropic co-founder Tom Brown and OpenAI CEO Sam Altman — alongside the G20 delegations; Lutnick and Kratsios led the conference for the United States, per CNBC’s description of the event.

Why it matters

The consensus statement is the Lutnick Commerce Department’s multilateral deliverable of 2026: at a moment when the administration’s tariff policy had put it at odds with most of the G20, its Commerce Secretary and science adviser chaired the innovation ministerial to a unanimous, signed outcome. The statement is the document the G20 innovation track will be measured against, and the press conference is the on-record account of how the hosts describe what was agreed.

Scoreboard watch

Scoreboard watch: the G20 innovation ministerial statement reached consensus among all 20 member countries and was signed at the Chapel Hill ministerial, as Lutnick and Kratsios announced it on September 2, 2026. Flagged for the scoreboard editor; no entry is published from this page.

Sources: CNBC Television, “Commerce Sec. Howard Lutnick holds news conference at the G20 Innovation Ministerial — 9/2/26” (Sep. 2, 2026, embedded above; remarks as delivered by Secretary Lutnick and Director Kratsios; event guests per CNBC’s published description).