As the standup comedian, an emerging comedic talent, steps onto her platform in the Big Apple, she's not just thinking about which jokes to deliver. She also carefully considers what subjects to avoid. “I refrain from directly criticizing the administration,” she explained. Or if she ventures there, she ensures it isn't captured for online platforms. “I'd never publish openly material in which I openly disparage authorities … I think this is a habit acquired back home.”
Wang, 39, resided in the Chinese metropolis for almost ten years, departing in 2022. By 2025, she relocated to the US. When she got there, she dove into a frenzy of “revenge bingeing on freedom,” attending talks, protests, and exploring New York’s public library.
However in the year since Donald Trump was elected for the second time, there has been a “palpable change” in the atmosphere, she says. “In China, I knew where the line was, while here I'm standing on unstable ground.”
Her fears mirror a new political reality in the US which numerous individuals from China, or those with experience in China, find disturbingly familiar. Opponents are ostracised. The leader demands total allegiance. Journalists face scrutiny. Establishments come under fire.
The president has not been shy about his admiration for Xi Jinping, the nation's authoritarian figure. He has described Xi as “fantastic”. When they reached a temporary truce in the trade war on Thursday, the bonhomie between both figures of nations with vastly different political systems became clear. And after decades of optimism in America that closer ties with China could assist the growing nation become more open, in the current administration, it seems as if the US is shifting in China's path, rather than the other way around.
“America is experiencing an era of societal upheaval,” said Zhang Qianfan, an academic at Peking University. “The president, Trump, is attempting to rally the masses to marginalize or undermine the elite … reminiscent of what happened in China half a century ago.”
Ever since the administration unleashed what's termed Department for Government Efficiency, or the agency, on the Washington bureaucracy early on in office, numerous Chinese observers have viewed American governance via the perspective of the Cultural Revolution. Whether it is the rallying of young people to carry out the leader’s will, or cleansing institutions of those deemed opposition, the president as viewed from China has brought Mao-style chaos to the US, albeit absent equivalent degrees of force.
But after the upheaval of the early months of the new administration subsided, a new, distinct type of climate has emerged in the US, which in different ways also feels familiar to numerous Chinese individuals.
‘The Lighthouse Has Become Dimmer’
The deepest parallel between Trump’s America and the East is the crackdown on open expression.
Deng Haiyan, now a Chinese Communist party dissenter, ended up in the eye of a storm recently, the likes of which he’d only previously experienced in China. He has lived in America for several years, after escaping China because of pressure from officials.
Last fall, following the passing of a public figure, Deng tweeted that the individual was a “scumbag”. Similar to others across the US – who lost their jobs for making negative comments regarding him – he encountered a huge backlash. Relatives was doxed and he faced allegations of espionage attempting to create division.
“That event surprised me deeply. I hadn't thought such a thing could happen in America – something that should only happen in an authoritarian country,” Deng said.
Deng’s pile on came from fellow social media users, rather than the state, but that kind of social surveillance bears parallels with the East.
“In terms of going after those who disagree and monitoring public speech on topics that are sensitive … That’s starting to emerge here,” noted Maria Repnikova, a scholar at a US university. “That’s something that you see in the East now as too,” she said, adding that there were now fears in the US of students reporting on educators, a form of monitoring that has been encouraged by the CCP.
Zhang, the legal expert, said that liberal Chinese intellectuals such as him used to look to America for ideals, in part because public debate on domestic politics in China is risky. But now, “America 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 democratic governance, but since the new administration, this lighthouse seems to have become dimmer”.
Chinese liberals, typically, at least in private, critical of China’s political system, are increasingly finding it more acceptable than America’s, Zhang said. “It’s sort of difficult to acknowledge this … but post-COVID, the government seems to be doing the right thing in environmental protection and developing electric cars and investing in hi-tech,” he noted, while “the West, as represented by America, seems to be in decline.”
The Trump administration’s acquisition of stakes in American firms has prompted comparisons with China, where the distinction between government and business is often blurred.
Recently, the US government stated it will take a shareholder in a new company focused on mineral refinement, following comparable shares in additional firms it considers vital to national security. These moves have made some investors nervous that the US is embarking on a fresh phase of government meddling in the private sector.
Yet, there remain major differences between the US under Trump and China. Last month, multiple media outlets among others refused to sign to a Pentagon policy that demanded reporting solely on approved information. US courts have halted or reversed many of Trump’s actions, an action that would be unthinkable in the nation's CCP-controlled judiciary.
An analyst, who established of a consulting firm, specializing in China, said: “The United States might face the worst crisis of all time, orders of magnitudes worse than currently, and it would remain more free, open, and liberal than the East under its leader.”
Zhang observes that while many intellectuals in China were shocked to see US universities yield to official requests concerning DEI policies and free speech on campus, in China, leading institutions are all state-owned by default. University leaders, which are appointed by the state, “have no liberty of saying no. They dare not defy orders.”
Nevertheless, Americans are beginning to adopt measures that were once confined to repressive regimes. An academic at an American college once outspoken on bilateral matters refused to be interviewed for this article. He stated: “The truth is, I fear of suppression in the US: I actually feel more comfortable to criticise Xi these days than say anything bad
