When the standup comedian, an emerging performer, steps onto the stage in the Big Apple, she is not only considering which jokes to tell. She also carefully considers which topics to avoid. “I refrain from directly attacking the government,” she explained. Or if she ventures there, she ensures it's not recorded for online platforms. “I would never publicly share material where I openly disparage authorities … I think it's a learned behavior acquired back home.”
Wang, thirty-nine, resided in Shanghai for nearly ten years, leaving in 2022. By 2025, she moved to America. When she got there, she dove into a frenzy of “revenge bingeing on democracy,” attending talks, demonstrations, and exploring the city's library system.
However over the past year after the president returned to office again, there has been a “palpable change” in the atmosphere, she notes. “In China, I knew the boundaries, whereas here I find myself on shifting sands.”
Her concerns reflect an emerging climate in the US which many Chinese, or those with experience in China, perceive as disturbingly similar. Enemies are ostracised. The leader expects absolute loyalty. Reporters are targeted. Establishments come under fire.
The president has openly expressed regarding his respect for China's leader, China’s strongman leader. He's called him as “fantastic”. When they reached a brief ceasefire in the trade war on Thursday, the camaraderie between the two leaders of nations with vastly different political systems was evident. And after decades of optimism in America that closer ties with the East may help the growing nation to liberalise, in the current administration, it appears that America is shifting in China's path, rather than vice versa.
“The United States is experiencing an era of cultural revolution,” stated a constitutional law expert, an academic at Peking University. “The top leader, Donald Trump, is attempting to rally the masses to sideline or undermine established figures … similar to events in the country decades past.”
Since the administration unleashed what's termed Department for Government Efficiency, or the agency, on federal institutions at the start in office, many in China have viewed American governance through the lens of the Cultural Revolution. Be it the rallying of the youth to carry out the leader’s will, or purging institutions of those deemed opposition, the president as viewed from China has brought disorder reminiscent of Mao to America, albeit absent the same levels of force.
However after the turmoil of the early months under Trump has calmed, an unfamiliar, different kind of climate has settled in the country, which variously also feels familiar to many Chinese individuals.
‘The Beacon Has Become Less Bright’
The deepest similarity between Trump’s America and China is the crackdown on open expression.
A former police officer, now a CCP dissenter, found himself in a controversy recently, similar to what he’d only previously experienced in his homeland. Deng resided in America since 2019, after escaping the country due to harassment from officials.
In September, after the death of Charlie Kirk, Deng tweeted that the individual was a “scumbag”. Like people nationwide – many of whom were fired as a result of making negative comments regarding him – he encountered significant backlash. Relatives had personal info leaked and he was accused of being a Chinese spy attempting to create division.
“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 backlash came from fellow social media users, rather than the state, but such of social surveillance also has similarities with China.
“Regarding going after dissenters and monitoring open discourse on topics that are sensitive … That’s starting to emerge in the US,” said an academic, a scholar at Georgia State University. “This is that you see in China today as too,” she added, stating that there were now fears in America of students reporting on teachers, a type of surveillance promoted by the CCP.
The professor, the Peking University law professor, explained that progressive thinkers like himself once turned to America for political inspiration, since openly discussing domestic politics in the country is dangerous. However, “America isn't a god for Chinese liberals. The US's reputation has declined generally.”
“We used to see America as the beacon of constitutional democracy, but since the new administration, this lighthouse seems to have become less luminous”.
Progressive Chinese, who are often, behind closed doors, skeptical about the nation's governance, now perceive it less objectionable than the US's, Zhang said. “It’s sort of difficult to acknowledge this … but after the pandemic, the government appears to be pursuing the right thing in improving the environment and developing electric cars and tech investment,” Zhang said, while “the West, as represented by America, appear in decline.”
The Trump administration’s acquisition of shares in US companies has prompted comparisons with the East, where the distinction between state and business is frequently unclear.
Recently, the US government announced it would become a shareholder in a new company focused on rare earth processing, after taking comparable shares in additional firms it considers vital to the country's safety. The deals have made some investors concerned that America is entering a fresh phase of state intervention in private industry.
Yet, there remain major differences 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 approved news. US courts have halted or overturned numerous presidential measures, an action that is unthinkable in China’s party-dominated legal system.
An analyst, the founder of a consulting firm, a China-focused advisory firm, commented: “The United States could descend into its gravest challenge of its history, far more severe than currently, and it will still be more free, more open, and more liberal than China under Xi.”
Zhang observes that although many intellectuals in China were surprised to see American colleges capitulate to government demands concerning DEI policies and free speech on campus, in the East, the top universities are publicly controlled inherently. Administrators, who are appointed by the government, “have no liberty refuse. They dare not to be disobedient.”
Still, Americans are starting to adopt measures previously associated with more authoritarian countries. An academic at an American college once outspoken on US-China issues refused to be interviewed for this piece. He stated: “Honestly, I fear of the censorship in the US: I genuinely feel less afraid criticizing China's leader these days than say anything bad
