As the standup comedian, a rising performer, steps onto her platform in the Big Apple, she is not just considering what humor to tell. Additionally, she carefully considers what subjects to avoid. “I don't engage in directly criticizing the administration,” she explained. Or if she ventures there, she ensures it isn't captured for social media. “I'd never publicly share material in which I openly disparage the government … I believe it's a habit acquired back home.”
The comedian, thirty-nine, resided in the Chinese metropolis for almost a decade, departing in 2022. By 2025, she moved to the US. When she got there, she embarked on an intense period of “overindulging on democracy,” going to talks, protests, and delving into New York’s public library.
But in the year after the president returned to office for the second time, there's been a noticeable shift in the environment, she notes. “In China, I knew the boundaries, while in the US I'm standing on unstable ground.”
Wang’s concerns reflect a new political reality in the US which numerous individuals from China, or people with experience in the country, find eerily familiar. Opponents are ostracised. The leader demands absolute loyalty. Reporters are targeted. Institutions are attacked.
Trump has not been shy about his admiration for China's leader, the nation's strongman leader. He has described Xi as “fantastic”. As they agreed a brief ceasefire in economic tensions on Thursday, the bonhomie between both figures of countries with vastly different political systems was evident. Following years of hope in the US that improved relations with China could assist the growing nation become more open, in the current administration, it seems that America is shifting in the Chinese direction, instead of the other way around.
“America is experiencing an era of cultural revolution,” said a constitutional law expert, an academic at a top Chinese university. “The president, Donald Trump, is trying to mobilise the masses in order to marginalize or weaken the elite … reminiscent of what happened in the country half a century ago.”
Since Trump unleashed what's termed a government streamlining body, or the agency, on federal institutions at the start of his term, numerous Chinese observers have viewed American governance via the perspective of China's historical period. Whether it is the mobilisation of the youth to carry out presidential directives, or cleansing institutions of perceived enemies, the president as viewed from China has delivered disorder reminiscent of Mao to America, albeit absent the same levels of force.
However since the upheaval of the initial period of the new administration subsided, a new, different kind of political atmosphere has settled in the US, which variously seems familiar to many Chinese individuals.
‘The Beacon Has Become Less Bright’
The most profound parallel between the US today and the East is the crackdown on free speech.
Deng Haiyan, now a CCP critic, found himself in a controversy this year, the likes of which he’d only previously experienced in his homeland. He resided in the US since 2019, having fled the country due to harassment from the authorities.
In September, after the death of a public figure, Deng tweeted that Kirk was “despicable”. Like people across the US – many of whom were fired for expressing criticism about Kirk – he encountered a huge backlash. His family had personal info leaked and he faced allegations of being a Chinese spy attempting to create division.
“This incident was a real shock. I never imagined such a thing could happen in the United States – what should only happen in a repressive state,” Deng said.
Deng’s backlash originated from online peers, instead of the government, but such of public monitoring bears similarities with China.
“In terms of going after dissenters and monitoring open discourse on topics that are sensitive … That’s starting to emerge in the US,” said Maria Repnikova, a scholar at Georgia State University. “That’s something that you see in China today as too,” she added, adding that there were now fears in the US of students reporting on teachers, a type of monitoring promoted by Chinese authorities.
Zhang, the legal expert, said that progressive thinkers such as him used to look to the US for political inspiration, in part because public debate on domestic politics in China is dangerous. However, “America isn't some kind of ideal for progressive Chinese. The US's reputation has declined generally.”
“We once viewed America as the symbol of constitutional democracy, but after Trump took power, this lighthouse seems to have become dimmer”.
Progressive Chinese, who are often, at least in private, skeptical about the nation's governance, are increasingly finding it less objectionable than America’s, Zhang said. “It’s sort of painful to accept this reality … but post-COVID, authorities seems to be doing the right thing in environmental protection and promoting EVs and investing in hi-tech,” Zhang said, while “Western nations, exemplified by America, seems to be declining.”
The government's purchase of shares in American firms has prompted comparisons with China, where the distinction between government and business is often blurred.
Recently, the US government stated it will take an investor in a startup focused on rare earth processing, following comparable shares in other companies deemed vital to national security. These moves have left certain stakeholders nervous that the US is entering a new era of state intervention in private industry.
Yet, there remain major differences between Trump’s America and China. Last month, multiple media outlets including the Guardian declined to agree to a Pentagon policy that demanded reporting solely on government-authorised information. American judiciary have halted or reversed numerous presidential measures, an action that is impossible in China’s CCP-controlled legal system.
Isaac Stone Fish, the founder of Strategy Risks, a China-focused advisory firm, commented: “America might face its gravest challenge of all time, orders of magnitudes worse than currently, and it will still be more free, open, and liberal than the East under its leader.”
Zhang observes that although numerous scholars in the country were shocked to see US universities yield to government demands concerning diversity and inclusion practices and free speech on campus, in the East, the top universities are all state-owned inherently. University leaders, who are selected by the government, “have no liberty refuse. They can’t afford to be disobedient.”
Still, Americans are starting to take precautions that were once associated with repressive regimes. One professor at a US university who was previously outspoken on bilateral matters declined to be interviewed for this article. He said: “The truth is, I fear of the censorship in the US: I genuinely feel more comfortable to criticise Xi these days than say anything bad
