As the standup comedian, an emerging performer, takes her platform in New York, she's not only considering what humor to tell. Additionally, she weighs which topics to avoid. “I don't engage in openly attacking the administration,” she explained. And when she ventures there, she ensures it's not captured for online platforms. “I'd never publicly share material where I openly disparage the government … I think this is a learned behavior from China.”
The comedian, thirty-nine, lived in Shanghai for nearly a decade, departing in 2022. By 2025, she relocated to the US. Upon arrival, she dove into an intense period of “revenge bingeing on democracy,” going to talks, protests, and delving into New York’s library system.
But in the year after the president was elected again, there has been a “palpable change” in the environment, she says. “In China, I understood where the line was, while here I find myself on shifting sands.”
Wang’s fears mirror a new climate in America which many Chinese, or those who have lived in China, find disturbingly similar. Opponents are ostracised. The leader expects total allegiance. Reporters face scrutiny. Institutions are attacked.
The president has not been shy about his admiration for China's leader, China’s strongman leader. He's called Xi as a “great guy”. When they reached a brief ceasefire in economic tensions recently, the camaraderie between the two leaders of countries with diametrically opposed political systems became clear. And after decades of optimism in America that closer ties with the East may help the rising power become more open, in the current administration, it appears as if the US is being pulled in the Chinese direction, rather than the other way around.
“The United States is undergoing an era of cultural revolution,” stated a constitutional law expert, a professor at a top Chinese university. “The president, Donald Trump, is trying to mobilise the grassroots in order to marginalize or undermine the elite … reminiscent of events in China half a century ago.”
Ever since Trump initiated what's termed a government streamlining body, or the agency, on the Washington bureaucracy at the start of his term, numerous Chinese observers see American governance via the perspective of the Cultural Revolution. Whether it is the mobilisation of young people to carry out presidential directives, or purging organizations of perceived enemies, Trump from a Chinese viewpoint has delivered Mao-style chaos to America, though absent equivalent degrees of violence.
However since the turmoil of the initial period under Trump has calmed, an unfamiliar, distinct type of political atmosphere has emerged in the US, which in different ways also feels familiar to numerous Chinese individuals.
‘The Beacon Has Become Dimmer’
The most profound similarity between Trump’s America and China is the suppression on open expression.
A former police officer, now a CCP critic, ended up in a controversy recently, the likes of which he’d only previously experienced in his homeland. He has lived in America for several years, after escaping China because of pressure from officials.
Last fall, following the passing of a public figure, he posted that Kirk was a “scumbag”. Like people nationwide – many of whom were fired as a result of making negative comments regarding him – Deng faced a huge backlash. His family had personal info leaked and he faced allegations of being a Chinese spy seeking to create division.
“This incident surprised me deeply. I never imagined that something like this could happen in America – something that typically happens in a repressive state,” he commented.
Deng’s pile on originated from online peers, instead of the government, but that kind of social surveillance bears parallels with China.
“In terms of targeting those who disagree and starting to surveil public speech on topics that are sensitive … That’s starting to emerge in the US,” noted an academic, a scholar at a US university. “This is that you see in the East now as too,” she added, stating that there were now fears in the US of pupils informing against teachers, a form of surveillance promoted by the CCP.
Zhang, the legal expert, explained that liberal Chinese intellectuals like himself once turned to America for ideals, since openly discussing domestic politics in China is risky. But now, “America isn't some kind of god for Chinese liberals. The US's reputation has worsened across the board.”
“We once viewed America as the beacon of constitutional democracy, but since the new administration, that guide appears less luminous”.
Chinese liberals, who are often, behind closed doors, skeptical about China’s political system, are increasingly finding it less objectionable than the US's, Zhang said. “It's somewhat difficult to acknowledge this reality … but post-COVID, the government appears to be pursuing correct policies in environmental protection and promoting EVs and investing in hi-tech,” he noted, while “Western nations, exemplified by America, seems to be in decline.”
The Trump administration’s acquisition of shares in US companies has also drawn parallels with the East, where the line between state and business is often blurred.
On Monday, the US government announced it will take an investor in a startup specialising in mineral refinement, following similar stakes in other companies deemed vital to national security. These moves have made certain stakeholders nervous that America is embarking on a fresh phase of state intervention in private industry.
Yet, there remain major differences between the US under Trump and the East. Last month, several news organisations including the Guardian declined to agree to a Pentagon policy that required they only report on government-authorised news. US courts have blocked or overturned numerous presidential measures, an action that is impossible in the nation's CCP-controlled judiciary.
Isaac Stone Fish, who established of Strategy Risks, specializing in China, commented: “America might face the worst crisis of all time, far more severe than currently, and it would remain more free, open, and liberal than China under Xi.”
Zhang notes that while many intellectuals in China were surprised to see American colleges capitulate to government demands regarding DEI policies and open discourse on campus, in the East, the top universities are publicly controlled by default. Administrators, which are selected by the state, “cannot of saying no. They dare not defy orders.”
Still, Americans are starting to adopt measures that were once confined to repressive regimes. An academic at an American college who was previously outspoken on US-China issues refused to be interviewed for this piece. He stated: “The truth is, I fear of the censorship here: I actually feel more comfortable criticizing China's leader now than say anything bad
