As the standup comedian, an emerging performer, takes the stage in New York, she's not just thinking about what humor to deliver. Additionally, she carefully considers which topics to steer clear of. “I don't engage in directly attacking the administration,” she explained. Or if she ventures there, she makes certain it's not recorded for social media. “I would never publicly share material in which I directly criticize the government … I think it's a learned behavior from China.”
Wang, thirty-nine, resided in the Chinese metropolis for almost ten years, leaving in that year. In 2025, she relocated to America. When she got there, she embarked on a frenzy of “revenge bingeing on freedom,” attending lectures, protests, and exploring New York’s library system.
However over the past year since the president was elected for the second time, there's been a “palpable change” in the environment, she says. “Back home, I knew the boundaries, whereas here I'm standing on unstable ground.”
Wang’s concerns mirror a new political reality in America which many Chinese, or people with experience in China, find eerily similar. Enemies are ostracised. The president demands total allegiance. Reporters face scrutiny. Institutions come under fire.
The president has not been shy regarding his respect for China's leader, the nation's authoritarian figure. He's called him as a “great guy”. When they reached a brief ceasefire in economic tensions on Thursday, the camaraderie between both figures of nations with diametrically opposed political systems was evident. Following years of optimism in America that closer ties with China may help the rising power to liberalise, in the current administration, it seems as if the US is being pulled in the Chinese direction, rather than the other way around.
“America is undergoing an era of cultural revolution,” stated Zhang Qianfan, a professor at a top Chinese university. “The president, Donald Trump, is attempting to mobilise the grassroots in order to marginalize or weaken the elite … similar to what happened in China decades past.”
Ever since Trump unleashed the so-called Department for Government Efficiency, or the agency, on federal institutions at the start of his term, many in China see US politics through the lens of China's historical period. Be it the rallying of the youth to execute presidential directives, or purging institutions of perceived enemies, Trump as viewed from China has brought disorder reminiscent of Mao to the US, though absent the same levels of violence.
However since the upheaval of the early months of the new administration subsided, an unfamiliar, distinct type of political atmosphere has emerged in the US, which variously also feels recognizable to many Chinese individuals.
‘The Beacon Has Become Less Bright’
The deepest similarity between the US today and the East is the crackdown on open expression.
A former police officer, now a Chinese Communist party dissenter, ended up in the eye of a storm this year, similar to what he once faced in his homeland. He resided in America since 2019, after escaping China because of pressure from officials.
In September, following the passing of Charlie Kirk, Deng tweeted that Kirk was “despicable”. Similar to others nationwide – many of whom were fired for making negative comments about Kirk – Deng faced significant backlash. His family had personal info leaked and he faced allegations of espionage seeking to create division.
“That event was a real shock. I never imagined that something like this could happen in America – what typically happens in an authoritarian country,” he commented.
His pile on came from fellow social media users, instead of the government, but that kind of social surveillance bears parallels with the East.
“Regarding targeting dissenters and starting to surveil open discourse on topics that are sensitive … That’s starting to emerge in the US,” noted Maria Repnikova, a scholar at a US university. “This is that you see in China now as too,” she said, adding that concerns are rising in the US of pupils informing against educators, a type of monitoring that has been encouraged by the CCP.
The professor, the Peking University law professor, said that progressive thinkers like himself used to look to the US for political inspiration, since openly discussing domestic politics in the country is dangerous. However, “America is no longer some kind of god for progressive Chinese. The US's reputation has worsened generally.”
“We used to see the US as the symbol of constitutional democracy, but after Trump took power, this lighthouse seems to have become less luminous”.
Chinese liberals, typically, at least in private, critical of the nation's governance, are increasingly finding it more acceptable than the US's, Zhang said. “It’s sort of painful to accept this … but post-COVID, the government seems to be doing correct policies in improving the environment and developing electric cars 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 parallels with China, where the line between government and business is frequently unclear.
On Monday, authorities stated it would become an investor in a new company specialising in mineral refinement, after taking similar stakes in additional firms deemed essential for the country's safety. These moves have left some investors nervous that the US is embarking on a new era of government meddling in private industry.
Yet, there remain major differences between the US under Trump and the East. In October, multiple media outlets among others declined to agree to a Pentagon policy that required reporting solely on approved news. American judiciary have halted or reversed numerous Trump’s actions, an action that would be unthinkable in China’s party-dominated judiciary.
Isaac Stone Fish, who established of Strategy Risks, specializing in China, said: “America might face the worst crisis of its history, far more severe than currently, and it will still be more free, open, and more liberal than China under Xi.”
The professor notes that although many intellectuals in China were shocked to see American colleges capitulate to government demands concerning diversity and inclusion practices and free speech on campus, in China, leading institutions are publicly controlled inherently. Administrators, who are appointed by the government, “cannot refuse. They dare not defy orders.”
Still, people in the US are starting to adopt measures that were once associated with repressive regimes. An academic at an American college once vocal on US-China issues declined to be interviewed for this piece. He stated: “Honestly, I fear of suppression in the US: I genuinely feel less afraid criticizing China's leader now than say anything bad
