As the standup comedian, a rising comedic talent, steps onto her platform in New York, she is not just considering which jokes to tell. She also carefully considers which topics to avoid. “I don't engage in directly attacking the government,” she explained. Or if she ventures there, she ensures it's not captured for online platforms. “I'd never publish openly content where I openly disparage authorities … I believe this is a habit from China.”
Wang, 39, resided in Shanghai for nearly a decade, leaving in that year. In 2025, she moved to America. When she got there, she embarked on an intense period of “overindulging on democracy,” attending talks, protests, and exploring the city's public library.
However in the year after the president was elected again, there's been a noticeable shift in the atmosphere, she says. “In China, I understood the boundaries, whereas in the US I find myself on shifting sands.”
Her fears mirror an emerging political reality in the US which many Chinese, or those who have lived in the country, find disturbingly familiar. Enemies face exclusion. The president expects total allegiance. Reporters face scrutiny. Institutions come under fire.
Trump has not been shy about his admiration for Xi Jinping, the nation's authoritarian figure. He's called him as a “great guy”. As they agreed a brief ceasefire in economic tensions recently, the bonhomie between the two leaders of countries with vastly different political systems became clear. Following years of optimism in America that closer ties with the East could assist the rising power to liberalise, under Trump 2.0, it appears as if the US is being pulled in the Chinese direction, rather than the other way around.
“The United States is undergoing a period of societal upheaval,” said Zhang Qianfan, an academic at Peking University. “The president, Donald Trump, is attempting to mobilise the masses in order to sideline or undermine the elite … reminiscent of events in the country decades past.”
Ever since Trump initiated what's termed Department for Government Efficiency, or Doge, on federal institutions at the start in office, many in China see American governance through the lens of China's historical period. Be it the rallying of the youth to execute presidential directives, or purging institutions of those deemed opposition, the president as viewed from China has delivered disorder reminiscent of Mao to the US, albeit without equivalent degrees of force.
However since the upheaval of the early months under Trump subsided, a new, distinct type of political atmosphere has emerged in the US, which in different ways seems familiar to numerous Chinese people.
‘The Lighthouse Is Dimmer’
The deepest parallel between the US today and China is the crackdown on free speech.
Deng Haiyan, now a Chinese Communist party critic, found himself in the eye of a storm this year, the likes of which he once faced in his homeland. He resided in America since 2019, after escaping the country because of pressure from the authorities.
In September, after the death of Charlie Kirk, Deng tweeted that Kirk was a “scumbag”. Like people nationwide – who were fired as a result of expressing criticism regarding him – he encountered significant backlash. Relatives was doxed and he was accused of espionage seeking to divide the US.
“This incident was a real shock. I never imagined that something like this would occur in the United States – what typically happens in an authoritarian country,” he commented.
His pile on originated from online peers, rather than the government, but such of social surveillance bears similarities with China.
“Regarding going after those who disagree and monitoring public speech on topics deemed controversial … That’s starting to emerge here,” said Maria Repnikova, an associate professor at a US university. “That’s something that you see in the East now as well,” she said, adding that there were now fears in America of students reporting on teachers, a type of monitoring that has been encouraged by Chinese authorities.
The professor, the Peking University law professor, said that liberal Chinese intellectuals such as him used to look to America for ideals, since openly discussing domestic politics in the country is dangerous. However, “The US is no longer some kind of god for progressive Chinese. The US's reputation has worsened across the board.”
“We used to see the US as the beacon of constitutional democracy, but after Trump took power, this lighthouse appears dimmer”.
Progressive Chinese, who are often, at least in private, critical of the nation's governance, now perceive it more acceptable than the US's, Zhang said. “It’s sort of painful to accept this … but after the pandemic, the government seems to be doing correct policies in improving the environment and promoting EVs and tech investment,” he noted, while “Western nations, as represented by America, appear declining.”
The Trump administration’s purchase of shares in American firms has also drawn parallels with China, where the distinction between government and business is frequently unclear.
On Monday, the US government announced it would become a shareholder in a new company focused on rare earth processing, after taking comparable shares in additional firms deemed vital to the country's safety. The deals have left some investors concerned that America is entering a new era of government meddling in private industry.
Yet, there remain major differences between Trump’s America and China. In October, several news organisations including the Guardian declined to agree to a defense department rule that demanded they only report on government-authorised information. US courts have halted or overturned numerous presidential measures, something that would be impossible in the nation's CCP-controlled legal system.
Isaac Stone Fish, who established of Strategy Risks, a China-focused advisory firm, said: “The United States could descend into the worst crisis of its history, orders of magnitudes worse than it is now, and it would remain freer, open, and more liberal than China under Xi.”
The professor notes that although numerous scholars in China were shocked to see US universities yield to government demands concerning diversity and inclusion practices and free speech on campus, in China, leading institutions are all state-owned by default. Administrators, who are selected by the state, “have no liberty refuse. They can’t afford to be disobedient.”
Still, people in the US are starting to adopt measures that were once associated with more authoritarian countries. An academic at an American college once outspoken on US-China issues declined to be interviewed for this article. He stated: “The truth is, I am scared of the censorship in the US: I genuinely feel more comfortable to criticise Xi these days than say anything bad
