When the standup comedian, a rising performer, takes her platform in the Big Apple, she is not only considering which jokes to deliver. Additionally, she carefully considers which topics to avoid. “I don't engage in openly attacking the administration,” she explained. Or if she ventures there, she makes certain it's not recorded for social media. “I would never publish openly material in which I directly criticize the government … I think it's a learned behavior from China.”
The comedian, thirty-nine, resided in Shanghai for almost ten years, departing in that year. By 2025, she moved to America. When she got there, she dove into an intense period of “overindulging on democracy,” attending lectures, demonstrations, and exploring the city's library system.
However in the year since Donald Trump returned to office for the second time, there has been a “palpable change” in the atmosphere, she says. “In China, I knew the boundaries, while here I find myself on shifting sands.”
Her fears reflect a new climate in America which many Chinese, or people who have lived in China, perceive as eerily familiar. Opponents face exclusion. The president expects absolute loyalty. Journalists face scrutiny. Institutions come under fire.
The president has openly expressed regarding his respect for Xi Jinping, the nation's strongman leader. He has described Xi as a “great guy”. When they reached a brief ceasefire in the trade war on Thursday, the camaraderie between the two leaders of countries with diametrically opposed governance models was evident. Following years of optimism in America that improved relations with the East may help the growing nation become more open, in the current administration, it seems as if the US is shifting in the Chinese direction, instead of vice versa.
“America is undergoing an era of societal upheaval,” said a constitutional law expert, a professor at Peking University. “The president, Trump, is trying to mobilise the grassroots in order to sideline or undermine the elite … similar to what happened in the country half a century ago.”
Since the administration unleashed the so-called a government streamlining body, or Doge, on the Washington bureaucracy at the start of his term, many in China see American governance via the perspective of the Cultural Revolution. Whether it is the mobilisation of young people to execute presidential directives, or cleansing institutions of those deemed opposition, Trump as viewed from China has delivered disorder reminiscent of Mao to the US, albeit without the same levels of force.
However since the upheaval of the initial period of the new administration has calmed, an unfamiliar, different kind of political atmosphere has settled in the country, which variously also feels recognizable to numerous Chinese people.
‘The Beacon Is Dimmer’
The deepest similarity between the US today and the East is the crackdown on free speech.
A former police officer, turned CCP critic, found himself in the eye of a storm this year, similar to what he’d only previously experienced in his homeland. Deng has lived in America since 2019, after escaping China because of pressure from the authorities.
Last fall, after the death of Charlie Kirk, he posted that Kirk was a “scumbag”. Like people across the US – many of whom lost their jobs as a result of making negative comments regarding him – Deng faced significant backlash. His family had personal info leaked and he was accused of espionage seeking to divide the US.
“This incident was a real shock. I never imagined such a thing would occur in the United States – something that typically happens in a repressive state,” Deng said.
Deng’s backlash originated from fellow social media users, instead of the state, but such of social surveillance also has parallels with China.
“In terms of going after those who disagree and monitoring open discourse about issues that are sensitive … That’s starting to emerge in the US,” noted an academic, a scholar at a US university. “This is observed in China today as well,” she said, stating that concerns are rising in the US of students reporting on teachers, a form of monitoring promoted by the CCP.
The professor, the legal expert, said that liberal Chinese intellectuals like himself once turned to the US for political inspiration, in part because openly discussing internal affairs in the country is dangerous. However, “America is no longer some kind of god for Chinese liberals. America’s image has declined across the board.”
“We once viewed America as the beacon of democratic governance, but after Trump took power, that guide appears dimmer”.
Progressive Chinese, typically, at least in private, skeptical about China’s political system, are increasingly finding it more acceptable than the US's, he stated. “It's somewhat difficult to acknowledge this reality … but after the pandemic, the government seems to be doing the right thing in improving the environment and developing electric cars and investing in hi-tech,” he noted, while “the West, exemplified by the United States, seems to be in decline.”
The government's acquisition of shares in US companies has also drawn comparisons with the East, where the distinction between state and business is often blurred.
Recently, the US government announced it would become an investor in a new company focused on mineral refinement, following comparable shares in other companies deemed vital to the country's safety. These moves have made certain stakeholders nervous that the US is embarking on a new era of state intervention in private industry.
Yet, there remain significant distinctions between the US under Trump and the East. Last month, multiple media outlets among others declined to agree to a defense department rule that demanded they only report on government-authorised news. US courts have halted or overturned many of presidential measures, something that is unthinkable in China’s party-dominated legal system.
Isaac Stone Fish, the founder of a consulting firm, a China-focused advisory firm, said: “The United States could descend into its gravest challenge of all time, far more severe than it is now, and it will still be more free, open, and liberal than China under Xi.”
Zhang observes that although many intellectuals in the country were surprised to see US universities capitulate to government demands regarding diversity and inclusion practices and free speech on university grounds, in the East, leading institutions are publicly controlled inherently. University leaders, which are appointed by the state, “have no liberty of saying no. They dare not defy orders.”
Still, Americans are beginning to adopt measures previously confined to more authoritarian countries. An academic at an American college who was previously outspoken on US-China issues declined to be interviewed for this piece. He said: “Honestly, I fear of suppression here: I genuinely feel less afraid criticizing China's leader now than say anything bad
