As the standup comedian, an emerging comedic talent, takes her platform in New York, she's not just thinking about what humor to deliver. She also weighs what subjects to avoid. “I don't engage in openly attacking the administration,” she stated. And when she does, she ensures it isn't captured for social media. “I would never publicly share material in which I openly disparage the government … I think this is a habit from China.”
Wang, 39, lived in Shanghai for nearly a decade, departing in 2022. By 2025, she relocated to the US. When she got there, she dove into an intense period of “overindulging on democracy,” attending talks, demonstrations, and delving into the city's library system.
However in the year since the president returned to office again, there has been a noticeable shift in the atmosphere, she says. “In China, I understood the boundaries, whereas here I'm standing on unstable ground.”
Wang’s concerns reflect an emerging political reality in the US which numerous individuals from China, or those who have lived in the country, find eerily similar. Enemies face exclusion. The president expects absolute loyalty. Reporters are targeted. Institutions are attacked.
The president has openly expressed about his admiration for China's leader, the nation's strongman leader. He has described him as “fantastic”. When they reached a brief ceasefire in economic tensions on Thursday, the camaraderie between both figures of nations with vastly different political systems became clear. And after decades of optimism in the US that improved relations with China may help the rising power become more open, under Trump 2.0, it appears as if America is shifting in the Chinese direction, instead of vice versa.
“The United States is experiencing a period of societal upheaval,” stated a constitutional law expert, a professor at Peking University. “The president, Trump, is attempting to mobilise the masses in order to marginalize or undermine the elite … reminiscent of events in China decades past.”
Since the administration unleashed what's termed Department for Government Efficiency, or the agency, on federal institutions at the start of his term, numerous Chinese observers have viewed US politics via the perspective of the Cultural Revolution. Be it the mobilisation of the youth to carry out presidential directives, or cleansing institutions of those deemed opposition, the president from a Chinese viewpoint has delivered disorder reminiscent of Mao to the US, though without equivalent degrees of violence.
But since the turmoil of the early months under Trump has calmed, an unfamiliar, different kind of climate has settled in the US, which variously also feels recognizable to numerous Chinese people.
‘The Beacon Has Become Dimmer’
The deepest parallel between the US today and China is the suppression on open expression.
Deng Haiyan, turned Chinese Communist party critic, ended up in a controversy this year, the likes of which he once faced in China. He has lived in the US for several years, after escaping the country because of pressure from officials.
Last fall, following the passing of a public figure, he posted that the individual was a “scumbag”. Like people nationwide – who lost their jobs as a result of making negative comments regarding him – Deng faced significant backlash. His family was doxed and he faced allegations of espionage attempting to divide the US.
“That event surprised me deeply. I hadn't thought that something like this would occur in America – what should only happen in an authoritarian country,” Deng said.
Deng’s pile on came from fellow social media users, instead of the government, but that kind of social surveillance also has parallels with the East.
“In terms of going after dissenters and monitoring open discourse about issues that are sensitive … It's appearing here,” said an academic, a scholar at a US university. “That’s something observed in China today as too,” she said, adding that there were now fears in the US of pupils informing against teachers, a type of surveillance promoted by the CCP.
Zhang, the Peking University law professor, explained that progressive thinkers such as him once turned to America for political inspiration, in part because public debate on domestic politics in China is dangerous. However, “The US isn't a god for progressive Chinese. America’s image has worsened across the board.”
“We used to see America as the symbol of constitutional democracy, but since the new administration, that guide seems to have become dimmer”.
Progressive Chinese, typically, behind closed doors, critical of China’s political system, are increasingly finding it more acceptable than America’s, he stated. “It's somewhat difficult to acknowledge this reality … but post-COVID, authorities appears to be pursuing correct policies in environmental protection and promoting EVs and tech investment,” he noted, while “Western nations, as represented by America, appear in decline.”
The Trump administration’s purchase of stakes in American firms has also drawn parallels with China, where the line between state and business is frequently unclear.
On Monday, the US government announced it will take a shareholder in a startup specialising in rare earth processing, after taking similar stakes in additional firms it considers vital to national security. The deals have left certain stakeholders nervous that the US is entering a fresh phase of government meddling in private industry.
There are still major differences between the US under Trump and the East. In October, several news organisations among others refused to sign to a defense department rule that demanded they only report on government-authorised news. US courts have blocked or reversed numerous Trump’s actions, something that is unthinkable in China’s party-dominated judiciary.
Isaac Stone Fish, the founder of a consulting firm, specializing in China, said: “America could descend into the worst crisis of its history, orders of magnitudes worse than currently, and it will still be freer, more open, and more liberal than China under Xi.”
The professor observes that although many intellectuals in China were shocked to see American colleges capitulate to official requests regarding DEI policies and free speech on campus, in China, the top universities are publicly controlled inherently. Administrators, which are appointed by the government, “have no liberty refuse. They dare not to be disobedient.”
Nevertheless, people in the US are starting to adopt measures that were once associated with repressive regimes. An academic at an American college once outspoken on bilateral matters declined to speak for this article. He said: “The truth is, I fear of the censorship here: I actually feel less afraid criticizing China's leader now than say anything bad
