When the standup comedian, an emerging comedic talent, takes the stage in the Big Apple, she is not just thinking about what humor to tell. Additionally, she weighs which topics to steer clear of. “I don't engage in directly criticizing the administration,” she stated. And when she does, she makes certain it isn't recorded for social media. “I'd never publish openly content where I directly criticize authorities … I think this is a learned behavior from China.”
Wang, 39, lived in the Chinese metropolis for nearly a decade, departing in 2022. By 2025, she relocated to America. Upon arrival, she embarked on a frenzy of “revenge bingeing on freedom,” going to talks, protests, and delving into the city's public library.
But in the year since Donald Trump was elected again, there's been a “palpable change” in the environment, she says. “In China, I knew the boundaries, whereas in the US I find myself on shifting sands.”
Her fears reflect a new climate in America which numerous individuals from China, or people who have lived in the country, find disturbingly familiar. Opponents face exclusion. The leader demands absolute loyalty. 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 him as a “great guy”. As they agreed a temporary truce in economic tensions recently, the bonhomie between the two leaders of nations with diametrically opposed governance models was evident. Following years of optimism in the US that closer ties with the East could assist the rising power become more open, in the current administration, it appears that America is shifting in China's path, rather than the other way around.
“America is undergoing an era of cultural revolution,” said a constitutional law expert, an academic at a top Chinese university. “The top leader, Donald Trump, is trying to mobilise the grassroots in order to sideline or weaken the elite … reminiscent of events in the country half a century ago.”
Since the administration initiated the so-called a government streamlining body, or Doge, on federal institutions early on of his term, many in China have viewed US politics via the perspective of China's historical period. Be it the mobilisation of the youth to execute the leader’s will, or purging organizations of those deemed opposition, Trump from a Chinese viewpoint has brought Mao-style chaos to the US, albeit without equivalent degrees of force.
But since the turmoil of the initial period of the new administration subsided, a new, different kind of political atmosphere has settled in the US, which in different ways seems familiar to many Chinese individuals.
‘The Lighthouse Is Less Bright’
The deepest similarity between Trump’s America and the East is the crackdown on free speech.
A former police officer, now a CCP dissenter, ended up in the eye of a storm this year, the likes of which he’d only previously experienced in China. Deng has lived in the US since 2019, having fled the country due to harassment from the authorities.
In September, following the passing of Charlie Kirk, he posted that Kirk was “despicable”. Similar to others across the US – who lost their jobs for expressing criticism about Kirk – Deng faced a huge backlash. Relatives was doxed and he faced allegations of being a Chinese spy attempting to create division.
“This incident was a real shock. I never imagined that something like this could happen in America – what typically happens in a repressive state,” Deng said.
Deng’s backlash came from fellow social media users, rather than the state, but such of social surveillance bears similarities with the East.
“In terms of going after dissenters and monitoring public speech about issues deemed controversial … That’s starting to emerge in the US,” said Maria Repnikova, a scholar at a US university. “That’s something observed in China today as well,” she said, stating that concerns are rising in the US of students reporting on teachers, a form of monitoring promoted by Chinese authorities.
The professor, the Peking University law professor, said that progressive thinkers like himself used to look to the US for political inspiration, since openly discussing domestic politics in China is risky. But now, “The US isn't some kind of ideal for progressive Chinese. The US's reputation has declined across the board.”
“We used to see America as the beacon of constitutional democracy, but after Trump took power, this lighthouse seems to have become dimmer”.
Progressive Chinese, typically, behind closed doors, skeptical about China’s political system, now perceive it less objectionable than America’s, Zhang said. “It's somewhat difficult to acknowledge this … but post-COVID, the government appears to be pursuing correct policies in improving the environment and developing electric cars and tech investment,” Zhang said, while “Western nations, as represented by America, appear declining.”
The government's acquisition of stakes in US companies has prompted comparisons with the East, where the line between state and private industry is often blurred.
On Monday, the US government announced it will take an investor in a startup specialising in rare earth processing, following comparable shares in additional firms deemed vital to national security. These moves have left 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 the East. Last month, several news organisations including the Guardian refused to sign to a defense department rule that required reporting solely on approved information. American judiciary have halted or reversed numerous Trump’s actions, an action that would be impossible in China’s CCP-controlled judiciary.
Isaac Stone Fish, the founder of Strategy Risks, specializing in China, said: “America could descend into its gravest challenge of all time, orders of magnitudes worse than it is now, and it will still be freer, more open, and liberal than the East under its leader.”
The professor notes that although many intellectuals in China were shocked to see US universities yield to government demands concerning DEI policies and free speech on campus, in the East, the top universities are all state-owned inherently. Administrators, which are appointed by the state, “have no liberty refuse. They can’t afford to be disobedient.”
Still, Americans are starting to adopt measures that were once confined to repressive regimes. One professor at a US university who was previously outspoken on US-China issues declined to be interviewed for this article. He said: “The truth is, I am scared of the censorship in the US: I genuinely feel less afraid criticizing China's leader these days than say anything bad
