As the standup comedian, an emerging comedic talent, steps onto her platform in New York, she is not only thinking about which jokes to deliver. She also weighs which topics to avoid. “I refrain from openly attacking the administration,” she explained. Or if she ventures there, she makes certain it's not captured for online platforms. “I'd never publicly share material in which I directly criticize authorities … I think this is a learned behavior acquired back home.”
The comedian, 39, resided in Shanghai for nearly ten years, departing in 2022. In 2025, she moved to the US. When she got there, she dove into an intense period of “overindulging on democracy,” attending lectures, protests, and delving into New York’s public library.
However in the 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 the boundaries, while in the US I'm standing on shifting sands.”
Wang’s fears mirror a new climate in America which numerous individuals from China, or people who have lived in China, perceive as eerily familiar. Enemies face exclusion. The leader expects total allegiance. Journalists face scrutiny. Establishments are attacked.
The president has not been shy about his admiration for Xi Jinping, the nation's authoritarian figure. He's called Xi as “fantastic”. As they agreed a brief ceasefire in economic tensions recently, the bonhomie between both figures of countries with vastly different political systems became clear. Following years of optimism in the US that closer ties with the East may help the growing nation become more open, in the current administration, it appears as if America is being pulled in China's path, rather than vice versa.
“The United States is experiencing an era of cultural revolution,” said a constitutional law expert, an academic at a top Chinese university. “The president, Trump, is attempting to mobilise the grassroots to sideline or undermine the elite … similar to what happened in China half a century ago.”
Ever since Trump unleashed the so-called Department for Government Efficiency, or the agency, on the Washington bureaucracy at the start in office, numerous Chinese observers see American governance through the lens of the Cultural Revolution. Be it the rallying of young people to execute presidential directives, or purging institutions of those deemed opposition, Trump from a Chinese viewpoint has brought Mao-style chaos to the US, albeit without equivalent degrees of force.
But after the upheaval of the initial period of the new administration subsided, a new, distinct type of political atmosphere has emerged in the country, which variously also feels familiar to numerous Chinese individuals.
‘The Beacon Is Less Bright’
The most profound similarity between Trump’s America and the East is the crackdown on free speech.
A former police officer, now a CCP critic, found himself in the eye of a storm this year, similar to what he’d only previously experienced in China. He resided in the US since 2019, after escaping the country due to pressure from the authorities.
Last fall, after the death of Charlie Kirk, he posted that Kirk was a “scumbag”. Like people across the US – who were fired as a result of making negative comments about Kirk – he encountered a huge backlash. His family had personal info leaked and he was accused of being a Chinese spy attempting to divide the US.
“This incident surprised me deeply. I never imagined such a thing would occur in the United States – something that typically happens in an authoritarian country,” Deng said.
His pile on originated from fellow social media users, rather than the government, but such of public monitoring bears similarities with the East.
“In terms of targeting those who disagree and starting to surveil public speech about issues that are sensitive … It's appearing in the US,” said an academic, a scholar at a US university. “That’s something that you see in the East now as well,” she said, adding that there were now fears in the US of students reporting on teachers, a form of surveillance that has been encouraged by Chinese authorities.
The professor, the Peking University law professor, said that progressive thinkers such as him once turned to the US for political inspiration, in part because openly discussing domestic politics in China is risky. However, “America isn't a ideal for progressive Chinese. The US's reputation has worsened across the board.”
“We once viewed the US as the beacon of democratic governance, but after Trump took power, this lighthouse seems to have become dimmer”.
Chinese liberals, typically, behind closed doors, skeptical about China’s political system, now perceive it more acceptable than the US's, he stated. “It’s sort of painful to accept this reality … but post-COVID, the government appears to be pursuing the right thing in improving the environment and developing electric cars and tech investment,” Zhang said, while “the West, as represented by America, seems to be in decline.”
The Trump administration’s acquisition of stakes in American firms has prompted comparisons with China, where the distinction between state and business is frequently unclear.
On Monday, authorities announced it will take a shareholder in a startup focused on mineral refinement, after taking similar stakes in additional firms deemed essential for national security. The deals have made certain stakeholders nervous that the US is entering a fresh phase of government meddling in the private sector.
There are still significant distinctions between the US under Trump and the East. Last month, multiple media outlets including the Guardian refused to sign to a defense department rule that required they only report on government-authorised news. American judiciary have halted or reversed numerous Trump’s actions, something that would be unthinkable in the nation's CCP-controlled judiciary.
An analyst, the founder of Strategy Risks, a China-focused advisory firm, commented: “America might face its gravest challenge of all time, orders of magnitudes worse than currently, and it would remain more free, open, and more liberal than the East under its leader.”
Zhang observes that while numerous scholars in China were surprised to see US universities capitulate to government demands regarding diversity and inclusion practices and free speech on university grounds, in the East, the top universities are all state-owned inherently. University leaders, which are appointed by the government, “cannot of saying no. They can’t afford to be disobedient.”
Nevertheless, people in the US are beginning to adopt measures previously associated with repressive regimes. One professor at an American college once outspoken on bilateral matters refused to speak for this article. He said: “The truth is, I fear of the censorship in the US: I actually feel less afraid to criticise Xi these days than say anything bad
