When the standup comedian, an emerging performer, steps onto her platform in the Big Apple, she's not just thinking about which jokes to deliver. Additionally, she weighs which topics to steer clear of. “I don't engage in directly criticizing the administration,” she stated. And when she ventures there, she makes certain it's not recorded for social media. “I would never publish openly material in which I openly disparage authorities … I believe it's a learned behavior acquired back home.”
The comedian, 39, lived in the Chinese metropolis for almost ten years, leaving in 2022. By 2025, she moved to the US. Upon arrival, she embarked on a frenzy of “revenge bingeing on democracy,” attending lectures, protests, and delving into the city's library system.
But in the year after the president was elected for the second time, there's been a noticeable shift in the environment, she says. “In China, I knew where the line was, whereas here I find myself on shifting sands.”
Her fears mirror an emerging political reality in the US which many Chinese, or those who have lived in the country, find eerily similar. Enemies are ostracised. The leader demands total allegiance. Reporters are targeted. Institutions come under fire.
The president has not been shy about his admiration for China's leader, China’s authoritarian figure. He has described him as “fantastic”. As they agreed a temporary truce in the trade war on Thursday, the bonhomie between the two leaders of nations with vastly different political systems was evident. And after decades of optimism 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, rather than the other way around.
“America is undergoing a period of cultural revolution,” stated Zhang Qianfan, an academic at Peking University. “The top leader, Donald Trump, is attempting to rally the masses to sideline or weaken the elite … similar to events in the country decades past.”
Since Trump initiated the so-called a government streamlining body, or the agency, on the Washington bureaucracy at the start of his term, numerous Chinese observers see American governance via the perspective of China's historical period. Whether it is the mobilisation of the youth to execute presidential directives, or purging institutions of those deemed opposition, Trump from a Chinese viewpoint has brought disorder reminiscent of Mao to the US, though without the same levels of violence.
But since the turmoil of the early months of the new administration subsided, an unfamiliar, different kind of political atmosphere has emerged in the US, which in different ways seems recognizable to many Chinese people.
‘The Lighthouse Has Become Dimmer’
The most profound similarity between the US today and the East is the suppression on open expression.
A former police officer, turned Chinese Communist party critic, found himself in the eye of a storm recently, the likes of which he once faced in China. He resided in the US since 2019, having fled China due to pressure from officials.
In September, after the death of a public figure, he posted that Kirk was a “scumbag”. Like people across the US – many of whom were fired for making negative comments about Kirk – he encountered a huge backlash. Relatives was doxed and he was accused of espionage attempting to create division.
“This incident surprised me deeply. I hadn't thought such a thing could happen in the United States – something that should only happen in an authoritarian country,” he commented.
His pile on originated from online peers, instead of the government, but such of public monitoring bears parallels with the East.
“In terms of going after dissenters and monitoring public speech 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 now as too,” she said, stating that concerns are rising in the US of pupils informing against teachers, a type of monitoring promoted by the CCP.
The professor, the Peking University law professor, said that liberal Chinese intellectuals like himself once turned to America for ideals, since public debate on internal affairs in the country is risky. However, “America isn't a ideal for Chinese liberals. The US's reputation has declined generally.”
“We used to see the US as the symbol of democratic governance, but after Trump took power, that guide seems to have become dimmer”.
Progressive Chinese, typically, behind closed doors, critical of China’s political system, are increasingly finding it more acceptable than the US's, he stated. “It’s sort of painful to accept this … but after the pandemic, authorities appears to be pursuing the right thing in environmental protection and promoting EVs and investing in hi-tech,” Zhang said, while “Western nations, exemplified by the United States, appear in decline.”
The Trump administration’s purchase of stakes in US companies has also drawn parallels with China, where the distinction between state and business is frequently unclear.
Recently, the US government stated it will take an investor in a new company specialising in rare earth processing, following similar stakes in other companies it considers essential for national security. The deals have left some investors concerned that America is entering a new era of government meddling in private industry.
There are still significant distinctions between the US under Trump and China. Last month, several news organisations including the Guardian declined to agree to a Pentagon policy that required reporting solely on government-authorised information. US courts have blocked or overturned many of Trump’s actions, something that would be impossible in China’s party-dominated judiciary.
Isaac Stone Fish, who established of a consulting firm, a China-focused advisory firm, said: “The United States could descend into the worst crisis of all time, far more severe than it is now, and it would remain more free, more open, and more liberal than China under Xi.”
The professor observes that although numerous scholars in the country were shocked to see US universities yield to official requests concerning diversity and inclusion practices and open discourse on university grounds, in China, leading institutions are publicly controlled by default. Administrators, which are appointed by the state, “have no liberty refuse. They can’t afford defy orders.”
Still, Americans are beginning to adopt measures previously confined to more authoritarian countries. An academic at a US university once outspoken on US-China issues declined to be interviewed for this article. He said: “Honestly, I am scared of suppression in the US: I actually feel more comfortable criticizing China's leader now than say anything bad
