As the standup comedian, an emerging comedic talent, steps onto her platform in New York, she's not just thinking about what humor to deliver. Additionally, she weighs which topics to steer clear of. “I don't engage in directly attacking the government,” she explained. And when she ventures there, she ensures it isn't captured for social media. “I'd never publish openly material in which I openly disparage authorities … I believe this is a habit from China.”
Wang, thirty-nine, resided in Shanghai for almost a decade, departing in 2022. By 2025, she moved to the US. When she got there, she embarked on a frenzy of “revenge bingeing on democracy,” going to lectures, protests, and exploring the city's library system.
But over the past year since Donald Trump returned to office again, there's been a “palpable change” in the environment, she says. “In China, I understood where the line was, while in the US I find myself on shifting sands.”
Her fears mirror an emerging political reality in the US which numerous individuals from China, or those who have lived in the country, find eerily familiar. Opponents are ostracised. The president expects total allegiance. Journalists are targeted. Institutions come under fire.
The president has not been shy about his admiration for China's leader, China’s authoritarian figure. He's called him as a “great guy”. As they agreed a brief ceasefire in economic tensions on Thursday, the bonhomie between both figures of countries with diametrically opposed governance models was evident. Following years of optimism in America that closer ties with the East may help the growing nation become more open, under Trump 2.0, it seems as if the US is being pulled in China's path, rather than the other way around.
“America is undergoing an era of cultural revolution,” said Zhang Qianfan, a professor at a top Chinese university. “The president, Trump, is trying to rally the masses in order to marginalize or undermine established figures … similar to what happened in the country decades past.”
Since the administration initiated what's termed Department for Government Efficiency, or Doge, on the Washington bureaucracy at the start of his term, many in China see US politics through the lens of the Cultural Revolution. Whether it is the mobilisation of young people to carry out the leader’s will, or purging organizations of perceived enemies, the president from a Chinese viewpoint has brought Mao-style chaos to the US, albeit without equivalent degrees of force.
But after the upheaval of the early months under Trump subsided, a new, different kind of political atmosphere has settled in the country, which in different ways also feels familiar to numerous Chinese individuals.
‘The Beacon Has Become Less Bright’
The most profound parallel between Trump’s America and the East is the suppression on open expression.
A former police officer, now a Chinese Communist party dissenter, ended up in a controversy this year, similar to what he’d only previously experienced in his homeland. He resided in America for several years, having fled China because of harassment from officials.
Last fall, after the death of Charlie Kirk, he posted that the individual was “despicable”. Like people nationwide – many of whom lost their jobs as a result of making negative comments regarding him – Deng faced significant backlash. Relatives was doxed and he was accused of espionage seeking to divide the US.
“This incident surprised me deeply. I never imagined that something like this would occur in the United States – what typically happens in a repressive state,” Deng said.
Deng’s backlash came from online peers, instead of the government, but such of social surveillance also has similarities with China.
“Regarding targeting those who disagree and starting to surveil public speech on topics deemed controversial … It's appearing here,” noted an academic, an associate professor at Georgia State University. “That’s something that you see in China today as too,” she added, adding that there were now fears in America of students reporting on teachers, a type of surveillance that has been encouraged by the CCP.
Zhang, the legal expert, explained that progressive thinkers like himself once turned to America for political inspiration, in part because public debate on internal affairs in the country is risky. However, “The US is no longer some kind of god for progressive Chinese. America’s image has declined across the board.”
“We used to see the US as the symbol of democratic governance, but since the new administration, this lighthouse seems to have become dimmer”.
Chinese liberals, who are often, behind closed doors, critical of the nation's governance, are increasingly finding it less objectionable than the US's, Zhang said. “It’s sort of painful to accept this … but post-COVID, authorities appears to be pursuing correct policies in improving the environment and promoting EVs and tech investment,” Zhang said, while “Western nations, exemplified by the United States, appear in decline.”
The government's acquisition of stakes in US companies has also drawn comparisons with China, where the distinction between government and private industry is frequently unclear.
Recently, the US government announced it would become a shareholder in a startup specialising in mineral refinement, following similar stakes in other companies deemed vital to the country's safety. The deals have left certain stakeholders concerned that America is embarking on a new era of state intervention in private industry.
Yet, there remain major differences between Trump’s America and the East. Last month, multiple media outlets including the Guardian refused to sign to a defense department rule that demanded reporting solely on approved news. US courts have blocked or overturned many of presidential measures, an action that would be impossible in the nation's party-dominated judiciary.
Isaac Stone Fish, the founder of a consulting firm, specializing in China, commented: “The United States might face its gravest challenge of all time, orders of magnitudes worse than currently, and it would remain more free, more open, and more liberal than China under Xi.”
Zhang observes that although numerous scholars in the country were shocked to see American colleges yield to official requests concerning DEI policies and open discourse on university grounds, in the East, the top universities are publicly controlled inherently. Administrators, which are selected by the government, “cannot refuse. They dare not to be disobedient.”
Nevertheless, people in the US are starting to adopt measures previously associated with repressive regimes. One professor at a US university who was previously outspoken on bilateral matters declined to be interviewed for this piece. He stated: “The truth is, I am scared of the censorship here: I actually feel less afraid criticizing China's leader these days than say anything bad
