When the standup comedian, a rising comedic talent, steps onto her platform in the Big Apple, she's not just thinking about what humor to tell. Additionally, she carefully considers which topics to avoid. “I don't engage in openly criticizing the government,” she stated. And when she ventures there, she makes certain it isn't recorded for online platforms. “I'd never publish openly content where I directly criticize the government … I think it's a habit from China.”
Wang, thirty-nine, resided in the Chinese metropolis for almost a decade, leaving in 2022. By 2025, she relocated to the US. Upon arrival, she embarked on a frenzy of “overindulging on democracy,” going to lectures, protests, and delving into New York’s public library.
However over the past year after the president returned to office again, there's been a “palpable change” in the atmosphere, she says. “In China, I understood the boundaries, while here I find myself on shifting sands.”
Wang’s fears mirror an emerging political reality in America which numerous individuals from China, or those with experience in the country, find disturbingly similar. Enemies are ostracised. The president demands absolute loyalty. Reporters are targeted. Institutions come under fire.
Trump has openly expressed regarding his respect for Xi Jinping, China’s authoritarian figure. He has described him as a “great guy”. As they agreed a brief ceasefire in the trade war recently, the bonhomie between both figures of countries with diametrically opposed political systems was evident. And after decades of hope in America that improved relations with the East may help the rising power to liberalise, in the current administration, it appears that the US is being pulled in the Chinese direction, rather than the other way around.
“America is undergoing an era of societal upheaval,” said a constitutional law expert, a professor at a top Chinese university. “The president, Trump, is attempting to mobilise the masses in order to marginalize or undermine the elite … similar to events in the country decades past.”
Ever since the administration initiated what's termed a government streamlining body, or the agency, on the Washington bureaucracy at the start in office, numerous Chinese observers have viewed US politics through the lens of the Cultural Revolution. Whether it is the mobilisation of young people to execute the leader’s will, or cleansing institutions of perceived enemies, the president as viewed from China has delivered Mao-style chaos to America, though without equivalent degrees of force.
However after the turmoil of the initial period of the new administration subsided, an unfamiliar, distinct type of political atmosphere has emerged in the country, which variously seems recognizable to numerous Chinese people.
‘The Lighthouse Has Become Less Bright’
The deepest parallel between Trump’s America and China is the suppression on open expression.
Deng Haiyan, turned CCP dissenter, ended up in a controversy this year, the likes of which he once faced in China. He resided in America for several years, after escaping the country because of pressure from officials.
In September, following the passing of a public figure, Deng tweeted that the individual was “despicable”. Like people across the US – many of whom were fired for expressing criticism regarding him – he encountered a huge backlash. Relatives had personal info leaked and he faced allegations of being a Chinese spy attempting to divide the US.
“That event was a real shock. I never imagined such a thing could happen in the United States – something that should only happen in a repressive state,” he commented.
Deng’s backlash originated from fellow social media users, rather than the government, but that kind of social surveillance bears parallels with China.
“In terms of targeting those who disagree and monitoring public speech on topics deemed controversial … That’s starting to emerge in the US,” said Maria Repnikova, a scholar at a US university. “That’s something that you see in China today as too,” she added, stating that concerns are rising in America of students reporting on educators, a type of monitoring that has been encouraged by the CCP.
The professor, the legal expert, said that progressive thinkers like himself once turned to America for political inspiration, since openly discussing domestic politics in the country is dangerous. But now, “The US is no longer some kind of ideal for Chinese liberals. The US's reputation has worsened across the board.”
“We once viewed the US as the symbol 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, are increasingly finding it less objectionable than the US's, he stated. “It’s sort of painful to accept this reality … but after the pandemic, the government seems to be doing the right thing in environmental protection and developing electric cars and tech investment,” he noted, while “the West, as represented by the United States, appear in decline.”
The government's purchase of shares in US companies has also drawn comparisons with the East, where the distinction between state and private industry is frequently unclear.
Recently, the US government announced it would become an investor in a startup focused on rare earth processing, following comparable shares in other companies it considers vital to national security. The deals have left certain stakeholders concerned that America is entering a new era of government meddling in private industry.
Yet, there remain major differences between Trump’s America and China. In October, multiple media outlets including the Guardian declined to agree to a Pentagon policy that required they only report on government-authorised news. American judiciary have halted or reversed many of presidential measures, an action that is impossible in China’s CCP-controlled judiciary.
An analyst, who established of a consulting firm, a China-focused advisory firm, commented: “America could descend into the worst crisis of all time, far more severe than it is now, and it would remain more free, more open, and liberal than China under Xi.”
Zhang observes that while many intellectuals in China were shocked to see American colleges yield to government demands concerning diversity and inclusion practices and free speech on campus, in China, the top universities are publicly controlled by default. Administrators, which are selected by the government, “have no liberty refuse. They can’t afford defy orders.”
Nevertheless, people in the US are beginning to take precautions that were once associated with more authoritarian countries. One professor at an American college once outspoken on bilateral matters refused to be interviewed for this piece. He stated: “The truth is, I fear of suppression in the US: I genuinely feel more comfortable to criticise Xi now than say anything bad
