When the standup comedian, an emerging performer, steps onto her platform in the Big Apple, she's not just thinking about which jokes to deliver. Additionally, she carefully considers what subjects to steer clear of. “I refrain from openly criticizing the administration,” she explained. And when she does, she ensures it's not recorded for social media. “I would never publicly share content in which I directly criticize authorities … I think this is a habit from China.”
Wang, thirty-nine, lived in Shanghai for almost ten years, leaving in 2022. By 2025, she relocated to the US. When she got there, she embarked on an intense period of “overindulging on democracy,” going to talks, protests, and delving into New York’s public library.
However in the year after the president returned to office for the second time, there's been a noticeable shift in the atmosphere, she notes. “In China, I knew the boundaries, whereas in the US I find myself on shifting sands.”
Her fears mirror a new political reality in America which many Chinese, or those with experience in China, find eerily familiar. Enemies face exclusion. The leader expects total allegiance. Reporters are targeted. Establishments come under fire.
The president has not been shy about his admiration for Xi Jinping, the nation's strongman leader. He has described Xi as a “great guy”. When they reached a temporary truce in the trade war on Thursday, the bonhomie between both figures of nations with diametrically opposed governance models was evident. Following years of hope in the US that closer ties with China could assist the growing nation become more open, under Trump 2.0, it appears as if America is shifting in the Chinese direction, rather than vice versa.
“The United States is undergoing an era of cultural revolution,” stated a constitutional law expert, an academic at a top Chinese university. “The top leader, Trump, is trying to rally the masses in order to marginalize or weaken established figures … reminiscent of what happened in China half a century ago.”
Ever since the administration initiated the so-called a government streamlining body, or the agency, on federal institutions at the start of his term, many in China have viewed US politics through the lens of the Cultural Revolution. Whether it is the mobilisation of young people to carry out presidential directives, or purging institutions of those deemed opposition, Trump as viewed from China has brought Mao-style chaos to America, albeit absent equivalent degrees of force.
However after the upheaval of the initial period under Trump subsided, an unfamiliar, distinct type of climate has emerged in the country, which variously seems familiar to numerous Chinese individuals.
‘The Beacon Is Dimmer’
The most profound similarity between Trump’s America and China is the crackdown on open expression.
Deng Haiyan, now a Chinese Communist party dissenter, ended up in a controversy this year, the likes of which he once faced in his homeland. He has lived in America since 2019, having fled the country due to pressure from officials.
In September, after the death of Charlie Kirk, Deng tweeted that the individual was “despicable”. Similar to others nationwide – many of whom lost their jobs as a result of expressing criticism regarding him – he encountered a huge backlash. His family was doxed and he faced allegations of being a Chinese spy attempting to divide the US.
“That event surprised me deeply. I never imagined such a thing would occur in America – something that should only happen in an authoritarian country,” he commented.
His backlash came from fellow social media users, rather than the government, but such of public monitoring also has similarities with China.
“In terms of targeting dissenters and monitoring open discourse on topics that are sensitive … It's appearing in the US,” said an academic, a scholar at a US university. “That’s something that you see in the East now as too,” she said, adding that concerns are rising in America of students reporting on teachers, a type of monitoring that has been encouraged by the CCP.
Zhang, the legal expert, explained that progressive thinkers such as him once turned to the US for political inspiration, since openly discussing domestic politics in the country is dangerous. However, “The US is no longer a ideal for progressive Chinese. The US's reputation has declined across the board.”
“We once viewed the US as the beacon of constitutional democracy, but after Trump took power, this lighthouse seems to have become dimmer”.
Chinese liberals, typically, at least in private, skeptical about the nation's governance, now perceive it more acceptable than America’s, he stated. “It's somewhat difficult to acknowledge this reality … but after the pandemic, authorities appears to be pursuing correct policies in improving the environment and developing electric cars and investing in hi-tech,” he noted, while “Western nations, exemplified by the United States, appear declining.”
The Trump administration’s purchase of stakes in American firms has also drawn parallels with China, where the distinction between state and business is often blurred.
Recently, authorities stated it will take an investor in a new company focused on mineral refinement, after taking comparable shares in additional firms it considers essential for national security. The deals have made some investors concerned that the US is entering a new era of state intervention in the private sector.
There are still significant distinctions between Trump’s America and China. Last month, multiple media outlets among others declined to agree to a defense department rule that required they only report on government-authorised information. US courts have blocked or reversed numerous Trump’s actions, an action that would be unthinkable in China’s party-dominated judiciary.
Isaac Stone Fish, the founder of a consulting firm, a China-focused advisory firm, said: “America could descend into the worst crisis of its history, orders of magnitudes worse than currently, and it would remain freer, open, and liberal than the East under its leader.”
The professor notes that although many intellectuals in China were shocked to see US universities yield to government demands concerning diversity and inclusion practices and free speech on university grounds, in China, leading institutions are publicly controlled inherently. University leaders, which are selected by the government, “cannot refuse. They can’t afford to be disobedient.”
Nevertheless, Americans are starting to take precautions previously confined to more authoritarian countries. An academic at a US university who was previously outspoken on US-China issues declined to be interviewed for this article. He stated: “The truth is, I am scared of the censorship here: I actually feel more comfortable criticizing China's leader these days than say anything bad
