The America Under the New Administration Feels Oddly Recognizable to Observers from the East

As Vickie Wang, an emerging comedic talent, steps onto the stage in New York, she is not just thinking about which jokes to tell. She also carefully considers which topics to steer clear of. “I don't engage in directly attacking the government,” she explained. Or if she ventures there, she makes certain it isn't recorded for online platforms. “I would never publicly share content where I openly disparage the government … I believe it's a habit acquired back home.”

The comedian, thirty-nine, resided in Shanghai for almost a decade, leaving in 2022. By 2025, she moved to the US. When she got there, she embarked on an intense period of “revenge bingeing on democracy,” going to talks, demonstrations, and exploring the city's library system.

But in the year since Donald Trump returned to office for the second time, there's been a “palpable change” in the atmosphere, she notes. “Back home, I understood the boundaries, while here I find myself on unstable ground.”

Her fears mirror an emerging climate in America which numerous individuals from China, or people with experience in the country, find disturbingly similar. Enemies are ostracised. The leader expects absolute loyalty. Journalists face scrutiny. Establishments come under fire.

Trump has openly expressed regarding his respect for China's leader, China’s authoritarian figure. He's called Xi as “fantastic”. As they agreed a temporary truce in the trade war recently, the bonhomie between both figures of countries with diametrically opposed governance models was evident. Following years of optimism in America that closer ties with China may help the rising power to liberalise, in the current administration, it appears that the US is shifting in the Chinese direction, instead of vice versa.

“The United States is undergoing an era of cultural revolution,” stated Zhang Qianfan, an academic at Peking University. “The president, Trump, is trying to rally the grassroots in order to marginalize or undermine established figures … similar to events in the country decades past.”

Since Trump unleashed what's termed a government streamlining body, or the agency, on federal institutions at the start in office, numerous Chinese observers see American governance via the perspective of the Cultural Revolution. Whether it is the mobilisation of young people to execute the leader’s will, or purging organizations of perceived enemies, the president as viewed from China has brought Mao-style chaos to America, though absent equivalent degrees of violence.

But after the turmoil of the early months under Trump subsided, an unfamiliar, distinct type of climate has emerged in the country, which in different ways seems familiar to many Chinese people.

‘The Lighthouse Has Become Dimmer’

The most profound similarity between Trump’s America and the East is the crackdown on free speech.

A former police officer, turned CCP dissenter, found himself in a controversy recently, similar to what he’d only previously experienced in his homeland. He resided in America since 2019, having fled China because of harassment from officials.

In September, after the death of Charlie Kirk, Deng tweeted that Kirk was “despicable”. Like people nationwide – who lost their jobs for making negative comments regarding him – Deng faced a huge backlash. His family was doxed and he was accused of espionage seeking to create division.

“That event was a real shock. I hadn't thought that something like this could happen in the United States – what typically happens in a repressive state,” he commented.

Deng’s backlash originated from fellow social media users, rather than the government, but such of social surveillance bears parallels with the East.

“Regarding going after dissenters and monitoring open discourse about issues that are sensitive … That’s starting to emerge in the US,” said an academic, an associate professor at a US university. “That’s something that you see in China today as well,” she said, stating that concerns are rising in the US of students reporting on teachers, a type of surveillance that has been encouraged by the CCP.

Zhang, the Peking University law professor, explained that progressive thinkers like himself used to look to America for political inspiration, since openly discussing internal affairs in the country is risky. But now, “The US isn't some kind of god for progressive Chinese. America’s image has declined generally.”

“We used to see the US as the beacon of constitutional democracy, but after Trump took power, that guide appears less luminous”.

Progressive Chinese, typically, at least in private, critical of the nation's governance, are increasingly finding it less objectionable than America’s, he stated. “It's somewhat painful to accept this … but post-COVID, authorities appears to be pursuing correct policies in improving the environment and developing electric cars and investing in hi-tech,” he noted, while “the West, as represented by America, appear declining.”

The Trump administration’s acquisition of stakes in American firms has prompted parallels with the East, where the line between state and private industry is frequently unclear.

On Monday, the US government stated it will take a shareholder in a startup specialising in mineral refinement, following similar stakes in other companies it considers essential for national security. These moves have left some investors concerned that the US is entering a fresh phase of state intervention in the private sector.

There are still significant distinctions between the US under Trump 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. US courts have halted or reversed many of presidential measures, something that is impossible in China’s party-dominated judiciary.

An analyst, the founder of Strategy Risks, a China-focused advisory firm, said: “America might face the worst crisis of its history, orders of magnitudes worse than it is now, and it will still be freer, open, and more liberal than China under Xi.”

The professor notes that while numerous scholars in the country were shocked to see US universities capitulate to government demands concerning diversity and inclusion practices and free speech on university grounds, in the East, leading institutions are publicly controlled by default. Administrators, which are appointed by the state, “cannot refuse. They dare not to be disobedient.”

Nevertheless, Americans are beginning to adopt measures that were once associated with repressive regimes. An academic at a US university once vocal on bilateral matters declined to be interviewed for this article. He said: “The truth is, I am scared of the censorship in the US: I genuinely feel more comfortable to criticise Xi now than say anything bad