As the standup comedian, an emerging performer, steps onto her platform in New York, she's not only thinking about what humor to deliver. Additionally, she weighs what subjects to avoid. “I don't engage in openly criticizing the administration,” she explained. And when she ventures there, she ensures it's not captured for online platforms. “I would never publish openly material where I directly criticize authorities … I believe this is a habit acquired back home.”
Wang, 39, resided in the Chinese metropolis for nearly a decade, leaving in that year. By 2025, she moved to the US. When she got there, she dove into an intense period of “revenge bingeing on democracy,” attending talks, demonstrations, and exploring New York’s library system.
However over the past year after the president returned to office for the second time, there has been a noticeable shift in the environment, she notes. “In China, I understood the boundaries, while in the US I'm standing on shifting sands.”
Her fears reflect a new political reality in the US which many Chinese, or those with experience in China, find eerily familiar. Enemies face exclusion. The president demands absolute loyalty. Journalists face scrutiny. Establishments come under fire.
Trump has not been shy regarding his respect for Xi Jinping, China’s authoritarian figure. He's called Xi as a “great guy”. When they reached a temporary truce in economic tensions recently, the camaraderie between both figures of countries with vastly different political systems was evident. Following years of hope in America that improved relations with the East may help the growing nation become more open, in the current administration, it seems that America is being pulled in the Chinese direction, rather than vice versa.
“The United States is experiencing a period of cultural revolution,” said a constitutional law expert, an academic at a top Chinese university. “The president, Trump, is trying to rally the grassroots to marginalize or weaken the elite … similar to what happened in the country decades past.”
Ever since Trump unleashed the so-called a government streamlining body, or the agency, on federal institutions at the start in office, numerous Chinese observers have viewed American governance through the lens of the Cultural Revolution. Be it the rallying of young people to execute the leader’s will, or purging institutions of those deemed opposition, Trump as viewed from China has brought disorder reminiscent of Mao to America, albeit absent equivalent degrees of force.
But since the upheaval of the initial period of the new administration subsided, a new, distinct type of climate has emerged in the US, 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, now a CCP critic, ended up in the eye of a storm this year, similar to what he’d only previously experienced in China. He resided in America for several years, after escaping China due to harassment from the authorities.
In September, following the passing of a public figure, he posted that the individual was “despicable”. Like people nationwide – many of whom were fired as a result of expressing criticism regarding him – Deng faced a huge backlash. His family had personal info leaked and he was accused of espionage seeking to divide the US.
“That event surprised me deeply. I never imagined such a thing could happen in the United States – what should only happen in a repressive state,” Deng said.
His pile on came from online peers, rather than the state, but such of social surveillance bears parallels with China.
“In terms of targeting those who disagree and monitoring public speech about issues deemed controversial … That’s starting to emerge in the US,” said an academic, a scholar at Georgia State University. “This is that you see in the East now as well,” she said, stating that there were now fears in America of students reporting on educators, a type of surveillance that has been encouraged by Chinese authorities.
The professor, the Peking University law professor, explained that liberal Chinese intellectuals like himself used to look to the US for political inspiration, since public debate on internal affairs in the country is risky. But now, “The US isn't some kind of god for progressive Chinese. America’s image has declined across the board.”
“We once viewed America as the beacon of constitutional democracy, but since the new administration, that guide appears dimmer”.
Chinese liberals, who are often, at least in private, critical of the nation's governance, are increasingly finding it more acceptable than America’s, he stated. “It's somewhat painful to accept this reality … but after the pandemic, the government appears to be pursuing the right thing in improving the environment and developing electric cars and investing in hi-tech,” he noted, while “the West, exemplified by America, seems to be in decline.”
The Trump administration’s purchase of shares in American firms has also drawn comparisons with the East, where the line between state and business is frequently unclear.
Recently, the US government stated it will take an investor in a startup specialising in mineral refinement, after taking comparable shares in other companies it considers vital to national security. These moves have made some investors nervous that the US is embarking on a fresh phase of state intervention in private industry.
Yet, there remain major differences between the US under Trump and the East. Last month, multiple media outlets including the Guardian declined to agree to a defense department rule that demanded they only report on approved information. US courts have blocked or reversed numerous Trump’s actions, something that is unthinkable in the nation's party-dominated judiciary.
An analyst, who established of Strategy Risks, specializing in China, said: “America might face its gravest challenge of its history, far more severe than currently, and it would remain more free, open, and liberal than the East under its leader.”
The professor notes that although numerous scholars in China were surprised to see US universities capitulate to government demands concerning DEI policies and open discourse on university grounds, in the East, the top universities are publicly controlled inherently. Administrators, who are appointed by the government, “have no liberty refuse. They dare not defy orders.”
Nevertheless, Americans are starting to adopt measures previously confined to repressive regimes. One professor at a US university who was previously outspoken on bilateral matters declined to be interviewed for this piece. He said: “The truth is, I am scared of suppression here: I actually feel more comfortable criticizing China's leader these days than say anything bad
