When the standup comedian, a rising performer, takes the stage in the Big Apple, she is not just thinking about which jokes to tell. Additionally, she carefully considers what subjects to avoid. “I refrain from directly attacking the administration,” she explained. Or if she ventures there, she makes certain it's not captured for social media. “I would never publish openly material in which I openly disparage the government … I believe this is a habit from China.”
The comedian, 39, lived in Shanghai for almost a decade, leaving in 2022. By 2025, she moved to America. Upon arrival, she embarked on a frenzy of “overindulging on freedom,” going to lectures, demonstrations, and exploring the city's public library.
But over the past year since the president was elected for the second time, there's been a “palpable change” in the environment, she notes. “Back home, I knew where the line was, while in the US I find myself on shifting sands.”
Wang’s fears reflect an emerging climate in the US which numerous individuals from China, or people with experience in China, perceive as eerily familiar. Opponents are ostracised. The president demands total allegiance. Reporters are targeted. Establishments come under fire.
The president has openly expressed about his admiration for China's leader, the nation's strongman leader. He's called Xi as “fantastic”. As they agreed a temporary truce in economic tensions on Thursday, the camaraderie between the two leaders of nations with diametrically opposed governance models became clear. Following years of optimism in America that improved relations with the East could assist the growing nation become more open, in the current administration, it appears that the US is being pulled in China's path, instead of vice versa.
“America is undergoing an era of societal upheaval,” said Zhang Qianfan, an academic at a top Chinese university. “The top leader, Donald Trump, is trying to rally the grassroots in order to sideline or weaken the elite … similar to what happened in the country decades past.”
Ever since Trump initiated what's termed a government streamlining body, or the agency, on federal institutions at the start of his term, many in China have viewed American governance through the lens of the Cultural Revolution. Whether it is the rallying of young people to carry out presidential directives, or purging organizations of perceived enemies, the president from a Chinese viewpoint has brought disorder reminiscent of Mao to the US, though absent equivalent degrees of force.
However since the upheaval of the early months under Trump subsided, an unfamiliar, different kind of political atmosphere has emerged in the country, which in different ways seems familiar to numerous Chinese individuals.
‘The Beacon Is Less Bright’
The deepest similarity between the US today and China is the suppression on free speech.
Deng Haiyan, now a CCP dissenter, ended up in a controversy this year, the likes of which he’d only previously experienced in China. He has lived in the US for several years, after escaping the country due to pressure from officials.
Last fall, following the passing of Charlie Kirk, he posted that Kirk was “despicable”. Like people across the US – many of whom were fired as a result of making negative comments regarding him – Deng faced significant backlash. His family was doxed and he was accused of being a Chinese spy seeking to create division.
“That event surprised me deeply. I hadn't thought that something like this could happen in the United States – what typically happens in a repressive state,” he commented.
Deng’s backlash came from online peers, instead of the state, but such of social surveillance also has parallels with the East.
“Regarding going after dissenters and starting to surveil open discourse about issues deemed controversial … That’s starting to emerge here,” noted an academic, an associate professor at Georgia State University. “That’s something that you see in the East now as well,” she said, stating that concerns are rising in the US of pupils informing against teachers, a type of surveillance promoted by Chinese authorities.
Zhang, the Peking University law professor, explained that progressive thinkers such as him once turned to America for political inspiration, since openly discussing domestic politics in China is dangerous. But now, “The US isn't some kind of god for progressive Chinese. America’s image has declined generally.”
“We once viewed America as the beacon of constitutional democracy, but since the new administration, this lighthouse seems to have become less luminous”.
Progressive Chinese, who are often, behind closed doors, critical of the nation's governance, are increasingly finding it less objectionable than the US's, he stated. “It’s sort of difficult to acknowledge this … but post-COVID, the government seems to be doing correct policies in environmental protection and promoting EVs and tech investment,” he noted, while “Western nations, as represented by America, seems to be declining.”
The government's acquisition of shares in US companies has prompted comparisons with China, where the line between state and private industry is often blurred.
Recently, authorities announced it will take a shareholder in a startup specialising in rare earth processing, after taking similar stakes in other companies it considers essential for national security. These moves have made some investors concerned that America is entering a new era of state intervention in private industry.
Yet, there remain major differences between the US under Trump and the East. In October, several news organisations among others refused to sign to a defense department rule that demanded they only report on approved news. American judiciary have blocked or reversed numerous Trump’s actions, something that would be unthinkable in China’s party-dominated legal system.
Isaac Stone Fish, the founder of Strategy Risks, a China-focused advisory firm, commented: “The United States might face its gravest challenge of all time, orders of magnitudes worse than it is now, and it would remain freer, more open, and liberal than the East under its leader.”
The professor notes that while many intellectuals in China were shocked to see US universities capitulate to government demands regarding DEI policies and open discourse on university grounds, in China, leading institutions are all state-owned by default. University leaders, who are selected by the state, “have no liberty of saying no. They can’t afford defy orders.”
Still, people in the US are beginning to adopt measures previously associated with more authoritarian countries. An academic at a US university who was previously vocal on US-China issues refused to be interviewed for this article. He stated: “Honestly, I fear of suppression here: I genuinely feel more comfortable criticizing China's leader these days than say anything bad
