Trump's America Under the New Administration Feels Strangely Recognizable to Observers from China

As the standup comedian, an emerging performer, steps onto her platform in New York, she's not just considering which jokes to deliver. She also weighs which topics to avoid. “I refrain from openly criticizing the government,” she explained. And when she does, she makes certain it's not recorded for online platforms. “I'd never publicly share content in which I directly criticize authorities … I think this is a learned behavior from China.”

The comedian, 39, lived in the Chinese metropolis for almost ten years, leaving in 2022. By 2025, she moved to the US. When she got there, she embarked on a frenzy of “revenge bingeing on democracy,” attending lectures, protests, and delving into New York’s library system.

However over the past year since Donald Trump returned to office again, there has been a “palpable change” in the environment, she says. “In China, I knew the boundaries, whereas in the US I find myself on unstable ground.”

Wang’s concerns mirror an emerging climate in the US which many Chinese, or those with experience in China, find disturbingly familiar. Enemies are ostracised. The president expects total allegiance. Reporters are targeted. Institutions come under fire.

Trump has openly expressed about his admiration for China's leader, the nation's authoritarian figure. He's called him as a “great guy”. When they reached a temporary truce in economic tensions recently, the camaraderie between the two leaders of nations with diametrically opposed political systems was evident. Following years of hope in the US that improved relations with China could assist the growing nation become more open, in the current administration, it appears that America is being pulled in China's path, rather than the other way around.

“America is undergoing a period of cultural revolution,” stated Zhang Qianfan, a professor at Peking University. “The president, Trump, is trying to mobilise the grassroots to marginalize or weaken established figures … reminiscent of events in China decades past.”

Since the administration initiated the so-called Department for Government Efficiency, or the agency, on the Washington bureaucracy early on of his term, many in China see American governance through the lens of the Cultural Revolution. Whether it is the rallying of young people to execute the leader’s will, or cleansing institutions of perceived enemies, Trump from a Chinese viewpoint has delivered Mao-style chaos to the US, though absent equivalent degrees of force.

However after the turmoil of the initial period of the new administration subsided, an unfamiliar, different kind of climate has settled in the country, which variously seems familiar to numerous Chinese people.

‘The Lighthouse Has Become Dimmer’

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

Deng Haiyan, now a Chinese Communist party critic, ended up in a controversy this year, the likes of which he’d only previously experienced in his homeland. He resided in the US since 2019, after escaping China because of pressure from the authorities.

Last fall, after the death of Charlie Kirk, Deng tweeted that the individual was “despicable”. Like people nationwide – many of whom lost their jobs for expressing criticism regarding him – he encountered a huge backlash. His family was doxed and he faced allegations of being a Chinese spy attempting to divide the US.

“This incident surprised me deeply. I never imagined that something like this could happen in America – what should only happen in an authoritarian country,” Deng said.

His pile on came from fellow social media users, instead of the government, but such of social surveillance also has similarities with the East.

“Regarding going after dissenters and monitoring public speech on topics that are sensitive … It's appearing here,” noted an academic, an associate professor at a US university. “That’s something observed in China now as too,” she added, stating that concerns are rising in the US of pupils informing against educators, a form of surveillance promoted by Chinese authorities.

Zhang, the legal expert, said that liberal Chinese intellectuals such as him once turned to the US for ideals, since openly discussing domestic politics in China is dangerous. But now, “The US isn't a ideal for progressive Chinese. The US's reputation has worsened generally.”

“We once viewed the US as the symbol of constitutional democracy, but since the new administration, that guide seems to have become dimmer”.

Chinese liberals, who are often, behind closed doors, critical of China’s political system, now perceive it more acceptable than America’s, Zhang said. “It's somewhat painful to accept this reality … but after the pandemic, the government seems to be doing correct policies in improving the environment and developing electric cars and tech investment,” he noted, while “Western nations, exemplified by the United States, seems to be declining.”

The government's purchase 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 announced it will take an investor in a new company focused on mineral refinement, after taking comparable shares in other companies it considers essential for national security. These moves have made some investors concerned that America is embarking on a new era of government meddling in private industry.

There are still major differences between the US under Trump and China. In October, multiple media outlets including the Guardian declined to agree to a Pentagon policy that required they only report on approved news. US courts have halted or overturned numerous presidential measures, an action that would be unthinkable in China’s party-dominated legal system.

Isaac Stone Fish, who established of Strategy Risks, specializing in China, said: “The United States might face the worst crisis of its history, orders of magnitudes worse than it is now, and it would remain more free, 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 yield 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, who are selected by the government, “have no liberty refuse. They can’t afford to be disobedient.”

Still, Americans are starting to adopt measures previously associated with more authoritarian countries. An academic at an American college once vocal on bilateral matters declined to speak for this piece. He stated: “Honestly, I am scared of suppression here: I genuinely feel less afraid to criticise Xi now than say anything bad