When the standup comedian, a rising performer, takes her platform in the Big Apple, she is not only thinking about which jokes to deliver. She also weighs which topics to avoid. “I don't engage in openly criticizing the government,” she stated. Or if she ventures there, she makes certain it isn't captured for social media. “I'd never publicly share material where I directly criticize authorities … I think this is a learned behavior acquired back home.”
Wang, 39, lived in Shanghai for almost a decade, leaving in 2022. By 2025, she relocated to the US. When she got there, she dove into an intense period of “revenge bingeing on democracy,” attending lectures, demonstrations, and exploring New York’s public library.
However in the year after the president was elected again, there has been a noticeable shift in the atmosphere, she says. “In China, I understood the boundaries, while here I find myself on unstable ground.”
Wang’s concerns mirror a new climate in America which many Chinese, or people who have lived in the country, find eerily familiar. Opponents face exclusion. The leader expects total allegiance. Journalists are targeted. Establishments are attacked.
Trump has not been shy about his admiration for China's leader, the nation's authoritarian figure. He has described Xi as “fantastic”. As they agreed a brief ceasefire in the trade war recently, the bonhomie between both figures of nations with diametrically opposed political systems was evident. And after decades of hope in the US that closer ties with the East may help the growing nation to liberalise, in the current administration, it appears that the US is being pulled in the Chinese direction, instead of the other way around.
“The United States is undergoing an era of societal upheaval,” said Zhang Qianfan, a professor at a top Chinese university. “The president, Donald Trump, is trying to rally the masses in order to sideline or weaken established figures … similar to events in China half a century ago.”
Ever since Trump unleashed what's termed a government streamlining body, or the agency, on federal institutions at the start of his term, many in China see American governance through the lens of China's historical period. Be it the mobilisation of the youth to execute presidential directives, or purging organizations of those deemed opposition, Trump from a Chinese viewpoint has brought disorder reminiscent of Mao to the US, albeit absent equivalent degrees of violence.
But after the turmoil of the early months under Trump subsided, an unfamiliar, different kind of climate has emerged in the country, which variously seems familiar to many Chinese individuals.
‘The Lighthouse Is Dimmer’
The most profound similarity between Trump’s America and the East is the crackdown on free speech.
Deng Haiyan, now a CCP critic, found himself in a controversy this year, similar to what he once faced in China. Deng has lived in America since 2019, after escaping China due to harassment from the authorities.
In September, after the death of Charlie Kirk, he posted that the individual was “despicable”. Like people across the US – many of whom lost their jobs as a result of making negative comments regarding him – Deng faced a huge backlash. His family had personal info leaked and he was accused of being a Chinese spy seeking to divide the US.
“This incident surprised me deeply. I hadn't thought that something like this would occur in America – what typically happens in a repressive state,” Deng said.
His pile on originated from fellow social media users, rather than the state, but such of social surveillance bears parallels with China.
“In terms of going after dissenters and starting to surveil open discourse about issues deemed controversial … That’s starting to emerge here,” noted Maria Repnikova, an associate professor at Georgia State University. “This is observed in the East now as well,” she said, adding that there were now fears in the US of students reporting on educators, a form of surveillance promoted by Chinese authorities.
Zhang, the Peking University law professor, said that progressive thinkers such as him used to look to America for political inspiration, in part because openly discussing internal affairs in China is dangerous. However, “America isn't a ideal for Chinese liberals. The US's reputation has worsened generally.”
“We used to see the US as the beacon of constitutional democracy, but after Trump took power, this lighthouse appears less luminous”.
Progressive Chinese, typically, at least in private, critical of the nation's governance, now perceive it less objectionable than the US's, Zhang said. “It's somewhat painful to accept this reality … but after the pandemic, authorities appears to be pursuing the right thing in improving the environment and promoting EVs and investing in hi-tech,” he noted, while “the West, exemplified by the United States, appear in decline.”
The government's acquisition of stakes in American firms has also drawn parallels with the East, where the line between state and business is often blurred.
Recently, authorities announced it would become an investor in a startup focused on rare earth processing, after taking similar stakes in other companies it considers essential for the country's safety. The deals have made some investors concerned that America is entering a fresh phase of government meddling in the private sector.
Yet, there remain significant distinctions between Trump’s America and China. In October, multiple media outlets including the Guardian refused to sign to a Pentagon policy that demanded reporting solely on approved information. US courts have halted or overturned numerous presidential measures, an action that is unthinkable in China’s CCP-controlled legal system.
Isaac Stone Fish, who established of Strategy Risks, specializing in China, said: “America could descend into the worst crisis of its history, orders of magnitudes worse than it is now, and it will still be more free, open, and liberal than the East under its leader.”
The professor notes that while numerous scholars in China were shocked to see American colleges capitulate to government demands concerning DEI policies and free speech on campus, in China, leading institutions are all state-owned by default. University leaders, which are selected by the state, “cannot refuse. They dare not defy orders.”
Nevertheless, people in the US are beginning to take precautions that were once confined to more authoritarian countries. One professor at a US university who was previously vocal on US-China issues declined to speak for this piece. He said: “The truth is, I am scared of the censorship here: I actually feel less afraid to criticise Xi these days than say anything bad
