When the standup comedian, a rising comedic talent, takes the stage in the Big Apple, she's not only considering which jokes to tell. Additionally, she weighs what subjects to avoid. “I don't engage in openly criticizing the administration,” she explained. And when she does, she makes certain it's not captured for online platforms. “I'd never publish openly material where I openly disparage authorities … I believe this is a habit acquired back home.”
Wang, 39, resided in the Chinese metropolis for almost ten years, leaving in 2022. By 2025, she relocated to America. Upon arrival, she dove into a frenzy of “overindulging on democracy,” attending talks, protests, and delving into New York’s public library.
However in the year since Donald Trump returned to office again, there's been a noticeable shift in the atmosphere, she says. “In China, I understood the boundaries, while here I'm standing on shifting sands.”
Wang’s concerns mirror a new climate in America which many Chinese, or people with experience in the country, perceive as disturbingly familiar. Enemies face exclusion. The president demands absolute loyalty. Reporters face scrutiny. Establishments are attacked.
Trump has openly expressed regarding his respect for Xi Jinping, China’s authoritarian figure. He's called Xi as “fantastic”. As they agreed a brief ceasefire in the trade war on Thursday, the camaraderie between the two leaders of nations with diametrically opposed governance models was evident. And after decades of optimism in America that improved relations with the East may help the rising power become more open, in the current administration, it appears that the US is shifting in China's path, rather than the other way around.
“America is undergoing a period of societal upheaval,” stated a constitutional law expert, a professor at Peking University. “The president, Trump, is trying to rally the masses to marginalize or weaken the elite … similar to events in the country decades past.”
Since Trump unleashed what's termed a government streamlining body, or Doge, on federal institutions at the start in office, numerous Chinese observers have viewed US politics via the perspective of the Cultural Revolution. Be it the mobilisation of young people to carry out the leader’s will, or cleansing institutions of perceived enemies, the president from a Chinese viewpoint has brought disorder reminiscent of Mao to the US, though without equivalent degrees of violence.
However since the upheaval of the initial period under Trump has calmed, an unfamiliar, different kind of climate has settled in the country, which in different ways also feels recognizable to numerous Chinese people.
‘The Lighthouse Is Less Bright’
The most profound similarity between the US today and China is the crackdown on free speech.
A former police officer, now a CCP critic, found himself in a controversy this year, similar to what he’d only previously experienced in China. He resided in America for several years, after escaping the country due to pressure from officials.
In September, after the death of a public figure, he posted that the individual was “despicable”. Like people across the US – many of whom were fired for making negative comments regarding him – Deng faced significant backlash. Relatives had personal info leaked and he was accused of espionage seeking to create division.
“That event surprised me deeply. I never imagined that something like this could happen in America – something that should only happen in an authoritarian country,” he commented.
His backlash came from online peers, rather than the state, but such of public monitoring also has parallels with the East.
“Regarding going after those who disagree and monitoring public speech about issues that are sensitive … It's appearing in the US,” said an academic, an associate professor at Georgia State University. “That’s something observed in the East today as well,” she added, adding that concerns are rising in America of students reporting on teachers, a type of monitoring promoted by Chinese authorities.
The professor, the Peking University law professor, said that progressive thinkers like himself once turned to the US for political inspiration, since openly discussing internal affairs in China is risky. But now, “America is no longer some kind of ideal for Chinese liberals. The US's reputation has declined generally.”
“We used to see the US as the beacon of democratic governance, but after Trump took power, that guide seems to have become less luminous”.
Progressive Chinese, typically, behind closed doors, skeptical about the nation's governance, now perceive it more acceptable than America’s, he stated. “It's somewhat difficult to acknowledge this … but post-COVID, authorities appears to be pursuing correct policies in environmental protection and promoting EVs and investing in hi-tech,” Zhang said, while “the West, as represented by the United States, seems to be in decline.”
The Trump administration’s purchase of stakes in US companies has also drawn parallels with China, where the line between state and business is often blurred.
On Monday, the US government announced it would become a shareholder in a startup specialising in mineral refinement, after taking comparable shares in additional firms deemed vital to the country's safety. These moves have made some investors nervous that the US is entering a fresh phase of state intervention in the private sector.
There are still significant distinctions between the US under Trump and China. In October, several news organisations among others refused to sign to a Pentagon policy that demanded reporting solely on government-authorised information. US courts have blocked or reversed many of Trump’s actions, something that is unthinkable in China’s party-dominated legal system.
Isaac Stone Fish, who established of Strategy Risks, a China-focused advisory firm, commented: “The United States could descend into the worst crisis of all time, orders of magnitudes worse than currently, and it would remain freer, more open, and liberal than the East under its leader.”
Zhang observes that while many intellectuals in the country were surprised to see US universities yield to government demands concerning diversity and inclusion practices and free speech on campus, in China, the top universities are all state-owned inherently. Administrators, which are selected by the state, “have no liberty of saying no. They dare not defy orders.”
Still, people in the US are starting to take precautions that were once confined to repressive regimes. An academic at a US university once outspoken on US-China issues declined to be interviewed for this piece. He said: “Honestly, I am scared of the censorship here: I genuinely feel more comfortable to criticise Xi these days than say anything bad
