When the standup comedian, a rising performer, steps onto her platform in the Big Apple, she's not only thinking about what humor to deliver. Additionally, she carefully considers which topics to avoid. “I don't engage in openly criticizing the government,” she stated. And when she does, she ensures it's not captured for social media. “I'd never publicly share content in which I openly disparage the government … I think this is a learned behavior acquired back home.”
Wang, thirty-nine, resided in Shanghai for nearly ten years, leaving in that year. In 2025, she moved to the US. Upon arrival, she embarked on an intense period of “revenge bingeing on freedom,” going to talks, protests, and delving into the city's public library.
However over the past year since the president was elected again, there has been a “palpable change” in the environment, she notes. “In China, I understood where the line was, whereas in the US I find myself on unstable ground.”
Her fears mirror a new climate in the US which many Chinese, or people who have lived in China, perceive as eerily familiar. Opponents are ostracised. The leader demands absolute loyalty. Reporters face scrutiny. Institutions come under fire.
Trump has openly expressed about his admiration for Xi Jinping, the nation's strongman leader. He has described him as a “great guy”. When they reached a temporary truce in economic tensions on Thursday, the bonhomie between the two leaders of nations with vastly different governance models became clear. And after decades of hope in America that closer ties with China could assist the growing nation become more open, under Trump 2.0, it appears that the US is shifting in China's path, 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 president, Donald Trump, is trying to mobilise the grassroots to sideline or undermine established figures … similar to what happened in the country half a century ago.”
Since the administration initiated the so-called a government streamlining body, or the agency, on federal institutions at the start in office, numerous Chinese observers have viewed US politics via the perspective of the Cultural Revolution. Whether it is the mobilisation of the youth to carry out presidential directives, or purging organizations of those deemed opposition, the president from a Chinese viewpoint has brought disorder reminiscent of Mao to the US, albeit absent equivalent degrees of violence.
But since the upheaval of the early months under Trump has calmed, an unfamiliar, distinct type of political atmosphere has emerged in the US, which variously seems familiar to numerous Chinese people.
‘The Beacon Has Become Dimmer’
The deepest parallel between Trump’s America and China is the crackdown on open expression.
Deng Haiyan, turned Chinese Communist party critic, found himself in the eye of a storm this year, the likes of which he once faced in his homeland. He has lived in the US since 2019, after escaping the country because of harassment from the authorities.
Last fall, after the death of a public figure, Deng tweeted that the individual was a “scumbag”. Like people nationwide – many of whom lost their jobs for expressing criticism regarding him – Deng faced a huge backlash. Relatives was doxed and he faced allegations of being a Chinese spy attempting to create division.
“That event was a real shock. I never imagined that something like this could happen in America – what typically happens in a repressive state,” he commented.
His backlash came from fellow social media users, instead of the government, but such of public monitoring also has parallels with the East.
“In terms of targeting those who disagree and starting to surveil public speech on topics that are sensitive … That’s starting to emerge in the US,” said Maria Repnikova, an associate professor at Georgia State University. “That’s something observed in China today as well,” she added, adding that there were now fears in the US of students reporting on educators, a type of surveillance that has been encouraged by Chinese authorities.
The professor, the Peking University law professor, said that progressive thinkers such as him used to look to the US for ideals, in part because openly discussing domestic politics in the country is dangerous. However, “The US is no longer a god for Chinese liberals. America’s image has worsened across the board.”
“We once viewed America as the beacon of constitutional democracy, but since the new administration, this lighthouse seems to have become less luminous”.
Chinese liberals, who are often, at least in private, skeptical about the nation's governance, now perceive it more acceptable than the US's, he stated. “It’s sort of painful to accept this … but after the pandemic, authorities seems to be doing the right thing in improving the environment and developing electric cars and tech investment,” Zhang said, while “Western nations, exemplified by the United States, appear in decline.”
The Trump administration’s purchase of stakes in US companies has prompted comparisons with China, where the distinction between government and business is frequently unclear.
Recently, authorities announced it will take a shareholder in a new company specialising in rare earth processing, after taking comparable shares in additional firms deemed vital to the country's safety. These moves have made some investors nervous that the US is entering a new era of government meddling in private industry.
There are still major differences between Trump’s America and the East. In October, several news organisations among others declined to agree to a Pentagon policy that demanded reporting solely on approved news. American judiciary have blocked or reversed numerous Trump’s actions, something that would be unthinkable in China’s party-dominated legal system.
Isaac Stone Fish, who established of a consulting firm, specializing in China, said: “America could descend into the worst crisis of all time, far more severe than it is now, and it would remain freer, more open, and more liberal than the East under its leader.”
Zhang notes that although many intellectuals in the country were surprised to see US universities yield to official requests concerning diversity and inclusion practices and open discourse on campus, in China, the top universities are all state-owned inherently. University leaders, who are selected by the government, “cannot of saying no. They dare not defy orders.”
Nevertheless, Americans are starting to adopt measures that were once confined to more authoritarian countries. One professor at an American college once vocal on US-China issues declined to speak for this article. He said: “The truth is, I fear of suppression in the US: I actually feel less afraid criticizing China's leader these days than say anything bad
