When the standup comedian, a rising performer, steps onto the stage in the Big Apple, she's not just considering which jokes to deliver. Additionally, she weighs which topics to steer clear of. “I don't engage in directly attacking the administration,” she explained. Or if she does, she makes certain it isn't recorded for online platforms. “I'd never publish openly content where I openly disparage authorities … I think this is a habit from China.”
The comedian, 39, lived in Shanghai for almost ten years, leaving in that year. In 2025, she moved to the US. Upon arrival, she dove into a frenzy of “overindulging on freedom,” going to lectures, demonstrations, and exploring New York’s library system.
But over the past year since the president returned to office for the second time, there's been a “palpable change” in the atmosphere, she notes. “Back home, I understood the boundaries, whereas here I find myself on unstable ground.”
Her concerns reflect a new climate in America which many Chinese, or those who have lived in China, find eerily familiar. Enemies are ostracised. The president expects total allegiance. Reporters are targeted. Institutions come under fire.
The president has not been shy about his admiration for Xi Jinping, China’s authoritarian figure. He has described Xi as a “great guy”. As they agreed a temporary truce in economic tensions recently, the camaraderie between the two leaders of nations with vastly different political systems was evident. Following years of optimism in America that closer ties with China could assist the rising power to liberalise, in the current administration, it appears as if America is shifting in the Chinese direction, instead of the other way around.
“The United States is experiencing a period of cultural revolution,” said Zhang Qianfan, an academic at a top Chinese university. “The top leader, Trump, is trying to mobilise the masses in order to sideline or weaken established figures … similar to events in the country decades past.”
Since Trump initiated what's termed a government streamlining body, or Doge, on the Washington bureaucracy at the start in office, many in China have viewed American governance via the perspective of the Cultural Revolution. Be it the mobilisation of the youth to carry out the leader’s will, or cleansing organizations of perceived enemies, Trump from a Chinese viewpoint has delivered Mao-style chaos to the US, though without the same levels of violence.
However after the upheaval of the initial period under Trump subsided, an unfamiliar, different kind of political atmosphere has emerged in the country, which in different ways seems recognizable to many Chinese people.
‘The Beacon Is Dimmer’
The most profound parallel between the US today and the East is the suppression on free speech.
Deng Haiyan, now a Chinese Communist party dissenter, ended up in the eye of a storm recently, the likes of which he’d only previously experienced in his homeland. Deng has lived in the US since 2019, having fled China because of harassment from officials.
Last fall, following the passing of a public figure, Deng tweeted that Kirk was a “scumbag”. Similar to others nationwide – who lost their jobs as a result of expressing criticism regarding him – Deng faced significant backlash. His family was doxed and he was accused of espionage seeking 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 a repressive state,” Deng said.
His backlash came from fellow social media users, rather than the state, but that kind of social surveillance also has parallels with China.
“Regarding going after dissenters and starting to surveil open discourse about issues that are sensitive … It's appearing here,” noted Maria Repnikova, a scholar at Georgia State University. “This is that you see in China now as well,” she added, stating that concerns are rising in the US of students reporting on educators, a type of monitoring that has been encouraged by Chinese authorities.
The professor, the Peking University law professor, explained that liberal Chinese intellectuals like himself once turned to the US for political inspiration, in part because public debate on domestic politics in the country is risky. But now, “The US is no longer some kind of god for progressive Chinese. America’s image has worsened generally.”
“We once viewed the US as the beacon of democratic governance, but after Trump took power, this lighthouse seems to have become dimmer”.
Progressive Chinese, 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 painful to accept this reality … but post-COVID, the government appears to be pursuing correct policies in environmental protection and developing electric cars and investing in hi-tech,” Zhang said, while “Western nations, as represented by America, appear declining.”
The government's acquisition of shares in US companies has also drawn parallels with China, where the line between government and private industry is frequently unclear.
Recently, the US government announced it would become a shareholder in a startup focused on mineral refinement, after taking similar stakes in additional firms deemed vital to the country's safety. These moves have left certain stakeholders concerned that America is entering a fresh phase of state intervention in private industry.
There are still major differences between Trump’s America and the East. In October, multiple media outlets among others refused to sign to a defense department rule that required they only report on government-authorised news. American judiciary have halted or overturned many of presidential measures, an action that would be impossible in the nation's party-dominated legal system.
An analyst, the founder of a consulting firm, a China-focused advisory firm, said: “The United States might face the worst crisis of all time, orders of magnitudes worse than it is now, and it will still be freer, more open, and liberal than the East under its leader.”
The professor observes that while numerous scholars in the country were shocked to see US universities capitulate to government demands regarding DEI policies and free speech on university grounds, in the East, the top universities are publicly controlled inherently. Administrators, who are selected by the government, “have no liberty of saying no. They dare not defy orders.”
Still, Americans are starting to adopt measures previously associated with repressive regimes. An academic at an American college who was previously outspoken on bilateral matters declined to be interviewed for this piece. He said: “The truth is, I fear of suppression here: I actually feel less afraid criticizing China's leader these days than say anything bad
