As the standup comedian, a rising comedic talent, steps onto the stage in New York, she's not only considering which jokes to tell. She also carefully considers which topics to steer clear of. “I refrain from openly criticizing the administration,” she explained. And when she ventures there, she ensures it isn't recorded for social media. “I would never publicly share content in which I openly disparage authorities … I think this is a learned behavior acquired back home.”
The comedian, 39, resided in Shanghai for nearly a decade, departing in 2022. By 2025, she moved to the US. Upon arrival, she embarked on a frenzy of “overindulging on freedom,” attending talks, demonstrations, and exploring the city's public library.
However in the year since the president was elected for the second time, there's been a noticeable shift in the environment, she says. “In China, I understood where the line was, whereas in the US I find myself on shifting sands.”
Her fears reflect an emerging political reality in the US which many Chinese, or those who have lived in China, perceive as disturbingly familiar. Opponents are ostracised. The president demands total allegiance. Reporters are targeted. Establishments are attacked.
Trump has openly expressed about his admiration for China's leader, China’s strongman leader. He has described him as “fantastic”. As they agreed a temporary truce in economic tensions recently, the bonhomie between the two leaders of countries with vastly different political systems was evident. Following years of hope in the US that improved relations with the East may help the growing nation become more open, under Trump 2.0, it appears as if the US is shifting in the Chinese direction, rather than vice versa.
“America is undergoing a period of cultural revolution,” said a constitutional law expert, an academic at Peking University. “The president, Trump, is trying to rally the grassroots in order to marginalize or weaken the elite … reminiscent of events in China decades past.”
Ever since Trump unleashed the so-called Department for Government Efficiency, or Doge, on the Washington bureaucracy early on of his term, 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 cleansing organizations of those deemed opposition, Trump as viewed from China has brought Mao-style chaos to the US, albeit without the same levels of violence.
However after the upheaval of the initial period under Trump has calmed, an unfamiliar, different kind of climate has emerged in the country, which variously seems recognizable to many Chinese individuals.
‘The Beacon Is Less Bright’
The deepest similarity between Trump’s America and the East is the suppression on free speech.
A former police officer, now a CCP dissenter, found himself in the eye of a storm recently, the likes of which he once faced in his homeland. Deng has lived in America for several years, having fled China because of harassment from the authorities.
In September, following the passing of a public figure, he posted that Kirk was a “scumbag”. Similar to others across the US – who lost their jobs for expressing criticism about Kirk – he encountered significant backlash. Relatives was doxed and he was accused of being a Chinese spy attempting to create division.
“This incident was a real shock. I hadn't thought such a thing would occur in America – what typically happens in an authoritarian country,” Deng said.
His pile on originated from online peers, instead of the government, but such of social surveillance bears parallels with China.
“In terms of going after dissenters and monitoring open discourse on topics deemed controversial … It's appearing here,” said Maria Repnikova, a scholar at Georgia State University. “That’s something observed in China today as too,” she added, stating that concerns are rising in the US of students reporting on teachers, a type of monitoring promoted by Chinese authorities.
Zhang, the legal expert, explained that progressive thinkers like himself once turned to the US for ideals, in part because openly discussing domestic politics in the country is dangerous. However, “The US isn't a god for progressive Chinese. The US's reputation has declined generally.”
“We used to see the US as the beacon of constitutional democracy, but after Trump took power, that guide seems to have become less luminous”.
Progressive Chinese, typically, at least in private, skeptical about China’s political system, are increasingly finding it less objectionable than America’s, Zhang said. “It’s sort of difficult to acknowledge this … but after the pandemic, the government appears to be pursuing correct policies in improving the environment and developing electric cars and tech investment,” Zhang said, while “Western nations, as represented by the United States, seems to be declining.”
The Trump administration’s acquisition of shares in US companies has prompted comparisons with the East, where the line between state and business is often blurred.
Recently, authorities stated it would become a shareholder in a startup focused on mineral refinement, after taking comparable shares in other companies it considers vital to national security. These moves have left certain stakeholders nervous that the US is entering a fresh phase of government meddling in the private sector.
There are still major differences between the US under Trump and China. Last month, several news organisations among others declined to agree to a Pentagon policy that required reporting solely on approved news. US courts have halted or reversed many of presidential measures, an action that is impossible in China’s party-dominated judiciary.
An analyst, the founder of Strategy Risks, specializing in China, commented: “America could descend into its gravest challenge of all time, orders of magnitudes worse than currently, and it will still be more free, open, and liberal than the East under its leader.”
Zhang notes that while many intellectuals in the country were shocked to see American colleges capitulate to official requests regarding DEI policies and free speech on university grounds, in China, leading institutions are publicly controlled by default. University leaders, who are appointed by the state, “cannot refuse. They dare not defy orders.”
Nevertheless, people in the US are starting to adopt measures that were once confined to repressive regimes. One professor at an American college once outspoken on bilateral matters declined to be interviewed for this article. He said: “The truth is, I fear of suppression in the US: I genuinely feel less afraid criticizing China's leader these days than say anything bad
