As the standup comedian, an emerging performer, steps onto the stage in the Big Apple, she is not just thinking about what humor to deliver. Additionally, she carefully considers which topics to avoid. “I refrain from directly attacking the government,” she explained. Or if she does, she makes certain it isn't captured for social media. “I would never publish openly content where I directly criticize authorities … I believe this is a habit from China.”
The comedian, 39, lived in Shanghai for almost a decade, departing in 2022. By 2025, she moved to America. Upon arrival, she dove into a frenzy of “overindulging on democracy,” going to talks, demonstrations, and delving into the city's library system.
But in the year after Donald Trump was elected again, there has been a “palpable change” in the atmosphere, she says. “Back home, I knew where the line was, whereas here I find myself on unstable ground.”
Her concerns reflect an emerging political reality in America which numerous individuals from China, or people with experience in China, find eerily familiar. Opponents face exclusion. The president expects total allegiance. Reporters face scrutiny. Institutions are attacked.
Trump has openly expressed regarding his respect for Xi Jinping, the nation's authoritarian figure. He's called Xi as “fantastic”. When they reached a brief ceasefire in the trade war recently, the camaraderie between the two leaders of countries with vastly different governance models became clear. Following years of hope in America that closer ties with China may help the rising power become more open, under Trump 2.0, it seems that America is shifting in China's path, instead of vice versa.
“America is undergoing an era of societal upheaval,” stated a constitutional law expert, an academic at Peking University. “The president, Trump, is trying to mobilise the grassroots in order to marginalize or weaken the elite … reminiscent of events in China decades past.”
Ever since the administration initiated what's termed Department for Government Efficiency, or the agency, on the Washington bureaucracy at the start in office, many in China have viewed US politics through the lens of the Cultural Revolution. Whether it is the mobilisation of young people to carry out presidential directives, or cleansing institutions of perceived enemies, the president from a Chinese viewpoint has delivered Mao-style chaos to America, though without equivalent degrees of violence.
However after the turmoil of the early months of the new administration subsided, a new, different kind of political atmosphere has emerged in the US, which in different ways seems familiar to numerous Chinese people.
‘The Beacon Has Become Dimmer’
The deepest parallel between Trump’s America and the East is the suppression on open expression.
Deng Haiyan, now a Chinese Communist party critic, ended up in a controversy this year, the likes of which he once faced in his homeland. Deng resided in America for several years, after escaping China because of harassment from officials.
Last fall, after the death of a public figure, Deng tweeted that the individual was “despicable”. Similar to others across the US – who lost their jobs as a result of expressing criticism regarding him – he encountered a huge backlash. Relatives was doxed and he faced allegations of espionage seeking to divide the US.
“That event surprised me deeply. I never imagined that something like this could happen in America – what typically happens in an authoritarian country,” he commented.
His backlash originated from fellow social media users, instead of the government, but that kind of public monitoring bears parallels with China.
“In terms of going after dissenters and starting to surveil open discourse about issues that are sensitive … It's appearing here,” said Maria Repnikova, an associate professor at a US university. “That’s something that you see in the East now as well,” she added, stating that there were now fears in the US of students reporting on educators, a type of monitoring promoted by the CCP.
Zhang, the legal expert, explained that progressive thinkers like himself used to look to America for ideals, in part because public debate on internal affairs in China is risky. However, “The US isn't a god for progressive Chinese. The US's reputation has worsened across the board.”
“We used to see America as the symbol of democratic governance, but since the new administration, this lighthouse seems to have become less luminous”.
Progressive Chinese, typically, at least in private, critical of China’s political system, are increasingly finding it more acceptable than the US's, he stated. “It's somewhat difficult to acknowledge this … but post-COVID, the government appears to be pursuing correct policies in environmental protection and promoting EVs and investing in hi-tech,” Zhang said, while “the West, as represented by the United States, seems to be declining.”
The Trump administration’s acquisition of shares in US companies has also drawn comparisons with China, where the distinction between state and private industry is frequently unclear.
Recently, the US government stated it will take an investor in a startup focused on rare earth processing, following comparable shares in additional firms deemed vital to national security. These moves have left certain stakeholders concerned that America is embarking on a new era of government meddling in the private sector.
There are still significant distinctions between Trump’s America and the East. In October, several news organisations including the Guardian declined to agree to a defense department rule that required reporting solely on approved news. American judiciary have halted or overturned numerous presidential measures, an action that would be impossible in the nation's party-dominated legal system.
An analyst, who established of Strategy Risks, specializing in China, said: “The United States could descend into the worst crisis of its history, orders of magnitudes worse than currently, and it will still be freer, open, and more liberal than China under Xi.”
The professor observes that while numerous scholars in China were surprised to see American colleges yield to official requests concerning DEI policies and open discourse on campus, in the East, the top universities are all state-owned inherently. Administrators, who are selected by the state, “cannot of saying no. They can’t afford defy orders.”
Still, people in the US are beginning to adopt measures previously confined to more authoritarian countries. An academic at an American college once outspoken on bilateral matters refused to speak for this piece. He stated: “The truth is, I fear of suppression in the US: I actually feel more comfortable criticizing China's leader these days than say anything bad
