As the standup comedian, a rising comedic talent, steps onto her platform in the Big Apple, she's not only considering which jokes to tell. She also weighs which topics to avoid. “I don't engage in directly attacking the administration,” she explained. Or if she does, she ensures it isn't recorded for online platforms. “I would never publish openly content where I directly criticize authorities … I think this is a habit acquired back home.”
Wang, thirty-nine, lived in the Chinese metropolis for almost a decade, leaving in 2022. By 2025, she moved to the US. Upon arrival, she dove into an intense period of “overindulging on democracy,” going to lectures, demonstrations, and exploring the city's public library.
But over the past year since Donald Trump returned to office for the second time, there has been a noticeable shift in the atmosphere, she notes. “In China, I understood where the line was, while in the US I'm standing on shifting sands.”
Her fears mirror an emerging climate in the US which many Chinese, or people who have lived in China, perceive as disturbingly similar. Opponents are ostracised. The leader demands absolute loyalty. Journalists are targeted. Institutions come under fire.
The president has openly expressed regarding his respect for China's leader, the nation's authoritarian figure. He's called Xi as a “great guy”. As they agreed a brief ceasefire in the trade war on Thursday, the bonhomie between the two leaders of nations with diametrically opposed political systems became clear. And after decades of hope in America that closer ties with the East could assist the rising power to liberalise, under Trump 2.0, it appears as if America is shifting in China's path, instead of the other way around.
“The United States is experiencing an era of cultural revolution,” said Zhang Qianfan, an academic at Peking University. “The president, Donald Trump, is attempting to rally the masses to sideline or undermine the elite … reminiscent of what happened in China half a century ago.”
Ever since Trump unleashed the so-called Department for Government Efficiency, or the agency, on the Washington bureaucracy at the start of his term, many in China see US politics through the lens of China's historical period. Whether it is the rallying of the youth to execute the leader’s will, or purging organizations of those deemed opposition, the president from a Chinese viewpoint has brought Mao-style chaos to America, though without the same levels of force.
However since the turmoil of the early months under Trump subsided, an unfamiliar, distinct type of political atmosphere has emerged in the US, which variously also feels familiar to many Chinese individuals.
‘The Lighthouse Is Dimmer’
The most profound similarity between the US today and the East is the suppression on free speech.
A former police officer, now a Chinese Communist party dissenter, ended up in the eye of a storm this year, similar to what he once faced in his homeland. He resided in the US for several years, after escaping the country due to harassment from the authorities.
Last fall, following the passing of Charlie Kirk, he posted that the individual was a “scumbag”. Similar to others nationwide – many of whom lost their jobs for making negative comments about Kirk – he encountered significant backlash. His family had personal info leaked and he faced allegations of espionage attempting to divide the US.
“This incident was a real shock. I never imagined that something like this would occur in America – what should only happen in an authoritarian country,” Deng said.
Deng’s backlash came from fellow social media users, instead of the state, but that kind of social surveillance bears similarities with China.
“Regarding going after dissenters and monitoring open discourse on topics deemed controversial … That’s starting to emerge here,” noted an academic, a scholar at a US university. “This is that you see in the East now as well,” she said, adding that concerns are rising in the US of pupils informing against teachers, a type of monitoring promoted by Chinese authorities.
The professor, the legal expert, explained that liberal Chinese intellectuals such as him once turned to America for political inspiration, since public debate on internal affairs in the country is risky. But now, “America isn't some kind of god for progressive Chinese. America’s image has declined generally.”
“We used to see the US as the beacon of constitutional democracy, but after Trump took power, this lighthouse seems to have become less luminous”.
Chinese liberals, who are often, behind closed doors, critical of China’s political system, now perceive it less objectionable than the US's, Zhang said. “It’s sort of difficult to acknowledge this … but post-COVID, authorities appears to be pursuing the right thing in improving the environment and promoting EVs and investing in hi-tech,” Zhang said, while “the West, exemplified by America, appear declining.”
The government's acquisition of shares in US companies has prompted comparisons with China, where the line between state and business is often blurred.
Recently, the US government announced it would become a shareholder in a new company specialising in rare earth processing, following similar stakes in additional firms it considers vital to national security. These moves have left some investors nervous that America is entering a new era of government meddling in the private sector.
Yet, there remain major differences between the US under Trump and the East. Last month, several news organisations among others declined to agree to a defense department rule that demanded reporting solely on approved information. American judiciary have halted or reversed numerous Trump’s actions, an action that is impossible in China’s CCP-controlled judiciary.
Isaac Stone Fish, the founder of a consulting firm, specializing in China, said: “America could descend into its gravest challenge of all time, orders of magnitudes worse than currently, and it would remain more free, open, and more liberal than the East under its leader.”
Zhang observes that although numerous scholars in China were surprised to see US universities yield to government demands concerning diversity and inclusion practices and free speech on university grounds, in the East, the top universities are publicly controlled by default. University leaders, who are appointed by the government, “have no liberty of saying no. They dare not defy orders.”
Nevertheless, people in the US are starting to adopt measures that were once associated with repressive regimes. One professor at an American college who was previously vocal on US-China issues declined to speak for this article. He stated: “The truth is, I fear of the censorship here: I genuinely feel less afraid to criticise Xi now than say anything bad
