When the standup comedian, a rising comedic talent, takes the stage in the Big Apple, she's not just thinking about which jokes to tell. She also weighs which topics to avoid. “I don't engage in openly criticizing the government,” she stated. And when she does, she makes certain it's not captured for online platforms. “I would never publish openly content where I directly criticize authorities … I believe it's a learned behavior from China.”
Wang, thirty-nine, resided in the Chinese metropolis for nearly ten years, leaving in 2022. By 2025, she relocated to America. When she got there, she embarked on an intense period of “revenge bingeing on freedom,” attending talks, protests, and delving into New York’s public library.
However over the past year since the president was elected for the second time, there's been a noticeable shift in the environment, she says. “In China, I knew the boundaries, whereas here I'm standing on unstable ground.”
Her fears mirror a new climate in America which many Chinese, or those who have lived in China, perceive as disturbingly similar. Opponents face exclusion. The president demands total allegiance. Reporters are targeted. Establishments are attacked.
Trump has not been shy about his admiration for China's leader, China’s authoritarian figure. He has described him as a “great guy”. As they agreed a temporary truce in economic tensions recently, the bonhomie between the two leaders of countries with diametrically opposed governance models became clear. And after decades of hope in America that closer ties with the East may help the rising power to liberalise, under Trump 2.0, it appears as if the US is being pulled in China's path, instead of the other way around.
“America is undergoing an era of societal upheaval,” stated Zhang Qianfan, a professor at a top Chinese university. “The president, Donald Trump, is attempting to mobilise the grassroots to sideline or undermine established figures … 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 in office, many in China see American governance through the lens of China's historical period. Be it the rallying of the youth to carry out presidential directives, or purging organizations of those deemed opposition, Trump from a Chinese viewpoint has delivered disorder reminiscent of Mao to the US, albeit absent equivalent degrees of violence.
But after the turmoil of the initial period of the new administration has calmed, a new, distinct type of climate has settled in the US, which in different ways seems recognizable to numerous Chinese individuals.
‘The Lighthouse Is Dimmer’
The deepest similarity between the US today and the East is the crackdown on free speech.
A former police officer, turned Chinese Communist party dissenter, found himself in a controversy recently, the likes of which he once faced in China. Deng resided in America since 2019, after escaping China due to pressure from officials.
In September, after the death of Charlie Kirk, Deng tweeted that the individual was a “scumbag”. Like people across the US – many of whom lost their jobs as a result of making negative comments about Kirk – Deng faced a huge backlash. His family was doxed and he faced allegations of espionage seeking to create division.
“That event surprised me deeply. I never imagined such a thing could happen in America – what typically happens in a repressive state,” he commented.
His backlash came from fellow social media users, rather than the government, but such of public monitoring also has similarities with the East.
“In terms of going after those who disagree and monitoring public speech on topics that are sensitive … It's appearing in the US,” noted an academic, a scholar at a US university. “That’s something that you see in China now as well,” she said, stating that there were now fears in the US of students reporting on teachers, a form of monitoring that has been encouraged by Chinese authorities.
The professor, the legal expert, said that progressive thinkers such as him used to look to the US for ideals, in part because openly discussing internal affairs in China is dangerous. But now, “The US isn't some kind of ideal for progressive Chinese. America’s image has declined across the board.”
“We once viewed the US as the beacon of constitutional democracy, but since the new administration, that guide appears dimmer”.
Chinese liberals, who are often, at least in private, skeptical about China’s political system, now perceive it less objectionable than America’s, he stated. “It’s sort of painful to accept this … but post-COVID, authorities seems to be doing correct policies in environmental protection and developing electric cars and investing in hi-tech,” he noted, while “Western nations, exemplified by the United States, appear in decline.”
The government's acquisition of shares in US companies has prompted parallels with the East, where the line between government and private industry is often blurred.
Recently, authorities stated it would become an investor in a startup specialising in rare earth processing, after taking similar stakes in other companies deemed vital to the country's safety. The deals have made certain stakeholders nervous that the US is embarking on a fresh phase of government meddling in the private sector.
Yet, there remain significant distinctions between the US under Trump and China. Last month, multiple media outlets among others declined to agree to a Pentagon policy that required they only report on approved news. American judiciary have halted or reversed numerous presidential measures, something that is impossible in the nation's party-dominated judiciary.
Isaac Stone Fish, the founder of a consulting firm, a China-focused advisory firm, commented: “America might face the worst crisis of all time, orders of magnitudes worse than currently, and it will still be freer, more open, and liberal than China under Xi.”
The professor notes that while many intellectuals in the country were shocked to see American colleges yield to official requests concerning diversity and inclusion practices and open discourse on campus, in the East, the top universities are publicly controlled by default. University leaders, who are selected by the government, “cannot refuse. They dare not defy orders.”
Still, people in the US are beginning to take precautions previously associated with more authoritarian countries. An academic at a US university once outspoken on US-China issues declined to speak for this piece. He said: “Honestly, I fear of the censorship in the US: I genuinely feel less afraid to criticise Xi these days than say anything bad
