When the standup comedian, an emerging performer, steps onto her platform in New York, she is not only considering what humor to tell. Additionally, she carefully considers which topics to steer clear of. “I don't engage in directly criticizing the administration,” she stated. Or if she ventures there, she makes certain it's not captured for social media. “I would never publish openly content in which I directly criticize authorities … I believe this is a learned behavior from China.”
Wang, 39, resided in the Chinese metropolis for nearly a decade, departing in 2022. By 2025, she relocated to America. When she got there, she embarked on a frenzy of “revenge bingeing on freedom,” attending lectures, protests, and delving into the city's public library.
However over the past year after Donald Trump returned to office for the second time, there's been a “palpable change” in the environment, she notes. “Back home, I knew where the line was, whereas in the US I'm standing on shifting sands.”
Wang’s concerns mirror a new political reality in the US which numerous individuals from China, or people who have lived in China, find eerily familiar. Enemies face exclusion. The president expects absolute loyalty. Journalists are targeted. Institutions are attacked.
The president has openly expressed regarding his respect for China's leader, China’s authoritarian figure. He has described Xi as a “great guy”. When they reached a temporary truce in the trade war on Thursday, the bonhomie between the two leaders of countries with diametrically opposed governance models became clear. And after decades of optimism in America that closer ties with the East may help the growing nation become more open, under Trump 2.0, it appears that the US is shifting in the Chinese direction, rather than the other way around.
“America is experiencing an era of societal upheaval,” stated a constitutional law expert, an academic at a top Chinese university. “The top leader, Trump, is trying to rally the grassroots in order to marginalize or undermine the elite … similar to what happened in the country decades past.”
Ever since Trump initiated the so-called a government streamlining body, or the agency, on federal institutions early on of his term, many in China have viewed American governance through the lens of the Cultural Revolution. Whether it is the rallying of young people to carry out presidential directives, or purging institutions of those deemed opposition, the president from a Chinese viewpoint has delivered disorder reminiscent of Mao to the US, though without the same levels of force.
But since the upheaval of the initial period under Trump subsided, a new, distinct type of political atmosphere has settled in the country, which in different ways also feels recognizable to numerous Chinese people.
‘The Lighthouse Has Become Dimmer’
The most profound similarity between Trump’s America and China is the crackdown on open expression.
Deng Haiyan, turned CCP dissenter, ended up in a controversy recently, similar to what he’d only previously experienced in China. Deng resided in America since 2019, having fled the country because of pressure from officials.
Last fall, after the death of Charlie Kirk, Deng tweeted that the individual was “despicable”. Like people nationwide – who lost their jobs for making negative comments about Kirk – he encountered significant backlash. His family had personal info leaked and he faced allegations of being a Chinese spy seeking to divide the US.
“This incident was a real shock. I hadn't thought that something like this would occur in the United States – what should only happen in an authoritarian country,” he commented.
Deng’s pile on came from fellow social media users, instead of the state, but that kind of public monitoring also has parallels with China.
“Regarding going after dissenters and monitoring public speech about issues that are sensitive … That’s starting to emerge here,” noted Maria Repnikova, an associate professor at Georgia State University. “That’s something that you see in the East now as too,” she added, stating that concerns are rising in the US of pupils informing against teachers, a type of monitoring promoted by the CCP.
The professor, the Peking University law professor, explained that liberal Chinese intellectuals such as him once turned to America for political inspiration, since openly discussing internal affairs in China is risky. However, “America isn't some kind of god for Chinese liberals. America’s image has declined generally.”
“We once viewed the US as the beacon of democratic governance, but since the new administration, this lighthouse seems to have become less luminous”.
Chinese liberals, who are often, at least in private, critical of the nation's governance, are increasingly finding it less objectionable than the US's, he stated. “It's somewhat difficult to acknowledge this … but after the pandemic, authorities seems to be doing the right thing in environmental protection and developing electric cars and investing in hi-tech,” Zhang said, while “Western nations, as represented by the United States, seems to be declining.”
The government's acquisition of stakes in US companies has also drawn comparisons with China, where the distinction between state and business is often blurred.
Recently, authorities stated it will take a shareholder in a startup specialising in mineral refinement, following similar stakes in additional firms it considers essential for national security. The deals have left certain stakeholders concerned that the US is embarking on a new era of state intervention in the private sector.
There are still significant distinctions between the US under Trump and China. Last month, multiple media outlets among others declined to agree to a defense department rule that required reporting solely on approved information. US courts have blocked or reversed many of Trump’s actions, something that is unthinkable in the nation's party-dominated legal system.
An analyst, the founder of a consulting firm, specializing in China, commented: “The United States might face the worst crisis of its history, far more severe than it is now, and it would remain freer, more open, and liberal than China under Xi.”
Zhang observes that although many intellectuals in the country were shocked to see US universities capitulate to official requests concerning DEI policies and open discourse on campus, in the East, leading institutions are all state-owned inherently. Administrators, who are appointed by the government, “cannot refuse. They dare not to be disobedient.”
Still, people in the US are starting to adopt measures previously confined to repressive regimes. One professor at a US university who was previously vocal on bilateral matters refused to speak for this piece. He said: “Honestly, I am scared of suppression in the US: I actually feel more comfortable criticizing China's leader now than say anything bad
