When the standup comedian, a rising performer, takes her platform in the Big Apple, she's not just thinking about what humor to deliver. Additionally, she carefully considers which topics to avoid. “I don't engage in directly attacking the government,” she explained. And when she ventures there, she ensures it isn't captured for online platforms. “I'd never publish openly material in which I openly disparage the government … I think this is a learned behavior acquired back home.”
The comedian, 39, lived in the Chinese metropolis for almost a decade, departing in that year. In 2025, she relocated to America. When she got there, she embarked on a frenzy of “overindulging on democracy,” attending talks, demonstrations, and exploring the city's public library.
However in the year since the president returned to office again, there has been a “palpable change” in the environment, she notes. “In China, I understood the boundaries, while here I find myself on unstable ground.”
Her concerns mirror an emerging political reality in the US which many Chinese, or those with experience in China, perceive as disturbingly familiar. Opponents are ostracised. The leader expects absolute loyalty. Journalists are targeted. Establishments come under fire.
The president has openly expressed about his admiration for Xi Jinping, China’s strongman leader. He's called him as a “great guy”. As they agreed a temporary truce in the trade war on Thursday, the bonhomie between the two leaders of nations with diametrically opposed political systems became clear. And after decades of hope in America that closer ties with China could assist the rising power become more open, in the current administration, it appears that the US is shifting in the Chinese direction, rather than the other way around.
“America is undergoing an era of cultural revolution,” stated a constitutional law expert, an academic at Peking University. “The president, Trump, is attempting to mobilise the grassroots to sideline or weaken established figures … similar to events in China half a century ago.”
Since the administration initiated what's termed Department for Government Efficiency, or the agency, on federal institutions early on in office, numerous Chinese observers have viewed American governance via the perspective of the Cultural Revolution. Whether it is the mobilisation of the youth to carry out presidential directives, or purging organizations of perceived enemies, Trump from a Chinese viewpoint has delivered Mao-style chaos to America, albeit absent equivalent degrees of force.
But after the upheaval of the early months under Trump subsided, an unfamiliar, different kind of climate has settled in the country, which in different ways seems familiar to many Chinese people.
‘The Beacon Is Dimmer’
The most profound parallel between the US today and China is the suppression on open expression.
A former police officer, 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. He resided in the US for several years, after escaping the country because of pressure from the authorities.
Last fall, after the death of a public figure, he posted that the individual was a “scumbag”. Similar to others nationwide – many of whom lost their jobs for making negative comments about Kirk – Deng faced a huge backlash. His family had personal info leaked and he was accused of espionage attempting to divide the US.
“That event surprised me deeply. I hadn't thought such a thing could happen in the United States – what should only happen in a repressive state,” he commented.
Deng’s pile on came from fellow social media users, instead of the state, but such of social surveillance bears similarities with the East.
“In terms of targeting dissenters and starting to surveil public speech about issues that are sensitive … That’s starting to emerge in the US,” noted an academic, a scholar at a US university. “That’s something observed in the East today as well,” she said, stating that there were now fears in the US of students reporting on teachers, a type of monitoring that has been encouraged by Chinese authorities.
The professor, the legal expert, said that liberal Chinese intellectuals like himself once turned to the US for political inspiration, in part because openly discussing internal affairs in the country is risky. However, “The US isn't some kind of ideal for Chinese liberals. The US's reputation has declined generally.”
“We once viewed the US as the beacon of constitutional democracy, but since the new administration, this lighthouse seems to have become dimmer”.
Progressive Chinese, who are often, at least in private, critical of the nation's governance, now perceive it more acceptable than America’s, Zhang said. “It's somewhat painful to accept this reality … but after the pandemic, authorities appears to be pursuing the right thing in improving the environment and promoting EVs and tech investment,” Zhang said, while “Western nations, as represented by the United States, appear declining.”
The government's purchase of shares in American firms has also drawn parallels with the East, where the line between government and private industry is often blurred.
Recently, authorities announced it would become an investor in a startup focused on mineral refinement, following similar stakes in other companies deemed essential for the country's safety. The deals have left certain stakeholders nervous that America is entering a new era of state intervention in private industry.
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 government-authorised information. American judiciary have blocked or reversed many of presidential measures, something that would be impossible in China’s party-dominated judiciary.
An analyst, the founder of a consulting firm, a China-focused advisory firm, said: “America might face its gravest challenge of its history, far more severe than it is now, and it would remain freer, open, and liberal than China under Xi.”
Zhang observes that while many intellectuals in China were shocked to see US universities capitulate to government demands concerning DEI policies and open discourse on campus, in China, leading institutions are all state-owned by default. University leaders, which are selected by the government, “cannot refuse. They dare not defy orders.”
Nevertheless, Americans are starting to adopt measures that were once associated with more authoritarian countries. An academic at an American college who was previously vocal on US-China issues refused to speak for this piece. He said: “The truth is, I am scared of the censorship in the US: I genuinely feel less afraid criticizing China's leader now than say anything bad
