When the standup comedian, an emerging comedic talent, takes her platform in New York, she's not just considering which jokes to tell. She also weighs what subjects to steer clear of. “I refrain from openly attacking the administration,” she stated. And when she ventures there, she ensures it isn't captured for online platforms. “I would never publish openly material where I directly criticize the government … I think it's a habit from China.”
The comedian, thirty-nine, resided in Shanghai for nearly ten years, departing in that year. By 2025, she relocated to the US. When she got there, she dove into a frenzy of “revenge bingeing on democracy,” attending talks, protests, and delving into New York’s public library.
But in the year since the president was elected for the second time, there's been a “palpable change” in the atmosphere, she says. “In China, I understood where the line was, while here I'm standing on shifting sands.”
Wang’s fears mirror a new climate in the US which many Chinese, or those with experience in the country, perceive as eerily similar. Opponents are ostracised. The leader expects total allegiance. Journalists face scrutiny. Institutions are attacked.
Trump has openly expressed regarding his respect for China's leader, China’s authoritarian figure. He's called him as “fantastic”. When they reached a temporary truce in economic tensions on Thursday, the camaraderie between the two leaders of countries with vastly different governance models became clear. Following years of optimism in the US that closer ties with the East may help the rising power to liberalise, in the current administration, it appears that the US is shifting in China's path, instead of the other way around.
“America is undergoing a period of cultural revolution,” said Zhang Qianfan, a professor at Peking University. “The president, Donald Trump, is trying to rally the masses to sideline or weaken established figures … reminiscent of what happened in the country half a century ago.”
Since the administration initiated what's termed a government streamlining body, or Doge, on the Washington bureaucracy early on of his term, numerous Chinese observers see US politics through the lens of the Cultural Revolution. Be it the rallying of young people to carry out presidential directives, or purging organizations of perceived enemies, the president as viewed from China has delivered Mao-style chaos to America, though without equivalent degrees of violence.
But since the upheaval of the early months under Trump has calmed, a new, different kind of climate has settled in the US, which in different ways seems familiar to many Chinese people.
‘The Beacon Is Less Bright’
The deepest parallel between Trump’s America and China 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. Deng resided in the US since 2019, after escaping China due to harassment from officials.
In September, after the death of a public figure, Deng tweeted that Kirk was “despicable”. Like people nationwide – who lost their jobs as a result of expressing criticism regarding him – Deng faced a huge backlash. His family was doxed and he faced allegations of being a Chinese spy seeking to divide the US.
“This incident surprised me deeply. I hadn't thought such a thing could happen in America – what should only happen in an authoritarian country,” he commented.
Deng’s pile on came from online peers, instead of the state, but that kind of social surveillance bears parallels with China.
“In terms of targeting dissenters and starting to surveil open discourse on topics that are sensitive … It's appearing here,” noted an academic, a scholar at a US university. “This is observed in China today as too,” she said, stating that concerns are rising in America of pupils informing against educators, a type of monitoring that has been encouraged by Chinese authorities.
Zhang, the legal expert, said that progressive thinkers like himself once turned to the US for ideals, since openly discussing domestic politics in the country is dangerous. However, “America isn't some kind of god for Chinese liberals. The US's reputation has declined generally.”
“We once viewed America as the symbol of democratic governance, but after Trump took power, this lighthouse seems to have become less luminous”.
Chinese liberals, who are often, behind closed doors, skeptical about China’s political system, are increasingly finding it less objectionable than America’s, he stated. “It's somewhat difficult to acknowledge this … but post-COVID, authorities seems to be doing correct policies in improving the environment and promoting EVs and investing in hi-tech,” he noted, while “Western nations, exemplified by the United States, seems to be in decline.”
The government's acquisition of stakes in US companies has also drawn comparisons with the East, where the line between government and business is frequently unclear.
On Monday, authorities stated it would become an investor in a startup specialising in rare earth processing, after taking similar stakes in other companies deemed vital to national security. The deals have left certain stakeholders nervous that the US is embarking on a fresh phase of government meddling in the private sector.
Yet, there remain significant distinctions between the US under Trump and China. In October, several news organisations among others declined to agree to a Pentagon policy that demanded reporting solely on government-authorised information. American judiciary have halted or reversed numerous Trump’s actions, something that is unthinkable in China’s CCP-controlled legal system.
An analyst, the founder of Strategy Risks, specializing in China, commented: “America could descend into its gravest challenge of its history, 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 while numerous scholars in the country were surprised to see American colleges yield to official requests concerning diversity and inclusion practices and open discourse on campus, in China, leading institutions are publicly controlled by default. University leaders, who are selected by the government, “have no liberty refuse. They can’t afford defy orders.”
Still, people in the US are beginning to adopt measures previously confined to repressive regimes. An academic at an American college who was previously vocal on US-China issues refused to be interviewed for this piece. He said: “Honestly, I am scared of suppression here: I actually feel more comfortable to criticise Xi these days than say anything bad
