When the standup comedian, an emerging comedic talent, steps onto the stage in the Big Apple, she's not just considering what humor to deliver. She also carefully considers which topics to avoid. “I don't engage in openly attacking the government,” she stated. And when she does, she ensures it isn't captured for social media. “I would never publish openly material where I directly criticize the government … I believe this is a learned behavior from China.”
The comedian, 39, lived in Shanghai for nearly a decade, leaving in 2022. By 2025, she moved to America. When she got there, she dove into a frenzy of “revenge bingeing on democracy,” attending lectures, demonstrations, and exploring New York’s library system.
However over the past year after Donald Trump was elected for the second time, there's been a noticeable shift in the atmosphere, she says. “In China, I knew the boundaries, whereas in the US I find myself on unstable ground.”
Wang’s concerns reflect an emerging climate in the US which numerous individuals from China, or those with experience in China, perceive as eerily familiar. Opponents are ostracised. The leader demands absolute loyalty. Journalists face scrutiny. Establishments come under fire.
The president has openly expressed regarding his respect for Xi Jinping, the nation's strongman leader. He's called Xi as a “great guy”. As they agreed a brief ceasefire in the trade war recently, the bonhomie between both figures of nations with vastly different political systems was evident. And after decades of hope in the US that improved relations with China may help the rising power to liberalise, under Trump 2.0, it appears as if the US is shifting in China's path, rather than vice versa.
“America is undergoing an era of cultural revolution,” said a constitutional law expert, an academic at a top Chinese university. “The president, Trump, is attempting to rally the masses to marginalize or undermine the elite … reminiscent of what happened in the country half a century ago.”
Ever since the administration unleashed what's termed Department for Government Efficiency, or Doge, on the Washington bureaucracy at the start in office, numerous Chinese observers see US politics via the perspective of China's historical period. Whether it is the rallying of the youth to execute presidential directives, or cleansing institutions of perceived enemies, the president from a Chinese viewpoint has brought Mao-style chaos to the US, albeit without equivalent degrees of force.
However since the turmoil of the initial period of the new administration subsided, an unfamiliar, different kind of political atmosphere has emerged in the country, which variously seems recognizable to numerous Chinese individuals.
‘The Beacon Is Dimmer’
The deepest parallel between Trump’s America and China is the suppression on free speech.
Deng Haiyan, now a CCP critic, ended up in the eye of a storm recently, the likes of which he’d only previously experienced in his homeland. Deng has lived in the US since 2019, having fled China because of harassment from the authorities.
In September, after the death of Charlie Kirk, he posted that Kirk was “despicable”. Similar to others nationwide – many of whom were fired as a result of expressing criticism about Kirk – Deng faced significant backlash. His family had personal info leaked and he faced allegations of espionage attempting to create division.
“This incident surprised me deeply. I never imagined such a thing could happen in the United States – what typically happens in a repressive state,” he commented.
His pile on came from fellow social media users, instead of the government, but such of public monitoring bears similarities with China.
“Regarding targeting dissenters and starting to surveil open discourse about issues deemed controversial … It's appearing in the US,” noted Maria Repnikova, a scholar at Georgia State University. “This is observed in the East now as too,” she added, stating that concerns are rising in America of students reporting on educators, a form of monitoring promoted by Chinese authorities.
Zhang, the Peking University law professor, said that progressive thinkers such as him used to look to America for political inspiration, since public debate on internal affairs in China is dangerous. However, “America is no longer a ideal for Chinese liberals. The US's reputation has declined across the board.”
“We once viewed America as the beacon of constitutional democracy, but since the new administration, this lighthouse seems to have become dimmer”.
Chinese liberals, who are often, behind closed doors, skeptical about the nation's governance, are increasingly finding it less objectionable than America’s, Zhang said. “It's somewhat painful to accept this reality … but post-COVID, authorities appears to be pursuing correct policies in improving the environment and developing electric cars and investing in hi-tech,” Zhang said, while “Western nations, exemplified by America, appear declining.”
The Trump administration’s acquisition of stakes in US companies has prompted comparisons with China, where the distinction between government and business is frequently unclear.
Recently, the US government stated it will take an investor in a startup specialising in rare earth processing, following similar stakes in other companies deemed vital to the country's safety. The deals have made some investors nervous that America is embarking on a fresh phase of state intervention in private industry.
There are still major differences between the US under Trump and the East. Last month, multiple media outlets among others declined to agree to a Pentagon policy that required reporting solely on approved information. American judiciary have halted or reversed numerous presidential measures, something that is impossible in the nation's CCP-controlled judiciary.
An analyst, the founder of a consulting firm, specializing in China, commented: “America might face the worst crisis of all time, orders of magnitudes worse than it is now, and it would remain more free, open, and more liberal than the East under its leader.”
Zhang observes that while many intellectuals in the country were shocked to see American colleges capitulate to government demands concerning DEI policies and open discourse on campus, in China, the top universities are all state-owned inherently. University leaders, who are selected by the state, “have no liberty refuse. They can’t afford to be disobedient.”
Still, Americans are starting to adopt measures previously associated with more authoritarian countries. One professor at a US university who was previously outspoken on bilateral matters declined to be interviewed for this article. He said: “Honestly, I am scared of the censorship in the US: I genuinely feel less afraid to criticise Xi now than say anything bad
