When the standup comedian, a rising performer, takes the stage in the Big Apple, she is not only thinking about which jokes to deliver. Additionally, she carefully considers what subjects to avoid. “I don't engage in directly criticizing the administration,” she stated. And when she does, she makes certain it's not captured for social media. “I would never publicly share material where I openly disparage authorities … I believe this is a learned behavior acquired back home.”
The comedian, thirty-nine, resided in Shanghai for almost ten years, leaving in that year. In 2025, she relocated to the US. Upon arrival, she embarked on an intense period of “overindulging on democracy,” attending lectures, demonstrations, and exploring the city's library system.
However over the past year after Donald Trump was elected again, there has been a “palpable change” in the atmosphere, she says. “Back home, I understood where the line was, whereas here I find myself on unstable ground.”
Her concerns mirror a new climate in the US which numerous individuals from China, or people with experience in the country, find eerily similar. Enemies face exclusion. The president demands total allegiance. Journalists face scrutiny. Institutions are attacked.
The president has openly expressed about his admiration for China's leader, China’s strongman leader. He has described him as “fantastic”. When they reached a temporary truce in economic tensions recently, the bonhomie between the two leaders of nations with vastly different political systems was evident. Following years of optimism in the US that improved relations with China could assist the growing nation to liberalise, under Trump 2.0, it seems that America is shifting in China's path, instead of the other way around.
“The United States is undergoing an era of societal upheaval,” said Zhang Qianfan, an academic at Peking University. “The top leader, Trump, is attempting to rally the masses in order to marginalize or undermine established figures … similar to what happened in the country half a century ago.”
Since Trump unleashed what's termed a government streamlining body, or the agency, on the Washington bureaucracy at the start in office, numerous Chinese observers have viewed US politics via the perspective of the Cultural Revolution. Be it the rallying of the youth to carry out the leader’s will, or purging organizations of perceived enemies, Trump as viewed from China has brought Mao-style chaos to America, though absent the same levels of force.
But since the upheaval of the early months under Trump subsided, a new, distinct type of political atmosphere has settled in the US, which variously also feels familiar to many Chinese individuals.
‘The Beacon Is Less Bright’
The most profound parallel between Trump’s America and China is the suppression on free speech.
A former police officer, turned CCP dissenter, ended up in a controversy this year, the likes of which he’d only previously experienced in China. He resided in the US for several years, having fled China due to harassment from the authorities.
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 for expressing criticism regarding him – Deng faced significant backlash. Relatives had personal info leaked and he was accused of espionage attempting to divide the US.
“This incident was a real shock. I never imagined such a thing would occur in the United States – what should only happen in an authoritarian country,” he commented.
His backlash came from online peers, instead of the government, but that kind of social surveillance bears parallels with the East.
“Regarding going after dissenters and monitoring public speech on topics deemed controversial … That’s starting to emerge here,” noted an academic, a scholar at a US university. “That’s something that you see in China now as well,” she added, adding that concerns are rising in the US of pupils informing against teachers, a type of monitoring promoted by Chinese authorities.
Zhang, the Peking University law professor, explained that progressive thinkers like himself once turned to the US for political inspiration, in part because openly discussing domestic politics in the country is dangerous. But now, “The US isn't a ideal for Chinese liberals. America’s image has worsened generally.”
“We used to see the US as the beacon of democratic governance, but since the new administration, this lighthouse seems to have become dimmer”.
Chinese liberals, who are often, at least in private, skeptical about the nation's governance, are increasingly finding it less objectionable than the US's, he stated. “It's somewhat painful to accept this reality … but post-COVID, the government seems to be doing correct policies in improving the environment and developing electric cars and investing in hi-tech,” he noted, while “the West, exemplified by America, appear in decline.”
The government's purchase of stakes in American firms has also drawn comparisons with the East, where the line between government and private industry is frequently unclear.
On Monday, the US government announced it will take an investor in a startup focused on rare earth processing, following comparable shares in additional firms deemed vital to national security. The deals have made certain stakeholders nervous that the US is embarking on a fresh phase of state intervention in the private sector.
Yet, there remain major differences between the US under Trump and the East. In October, multiple media outlets including the Guardian declined to agree to a Pentagon policy that required reporting solely on government-authorised news. American judiciary have blocked or reversed many of Trump’s actions, something that would be impossible in China’s party-dominated judiciary.
Isaac Stone Fish, who established of a consulting firm, a China-focused advisory firm, said: “America might face the worst crisis of its history, orders of magnitudes worse than currently, and it will still be more free, open, and more liberal than the East under its leader.”
The professor observes that while numerous scholars in China were surprised to see American colleges capitulate to official requests concerning DEI policies and open discourse on university grounds, in the East, leading institutions are all state-owned by default. Administrators, which are appointed by the government, “have no liberty of saying no. They can’t afford defy orders.”
Still, people in the US are beginning to take precautions that were once associated with repressive regimes. One professor at an American college once vocal on bilateral matters refused to speak for this article. He said: “Honestly, I am scared of the censorship in the US: I actually feel more comfortable criticizing China's leader these days than say anything bad
