The United States Under the New Administration Feels Strangely Familiar to Observers from China

When the standup comedian, a rising comedic talent, takes her platform in the Big Apple, she is not only thinking about which jokes to tell. Additionally, she weighs which topics to steer clear of. “I don't engage in openly criticizing the administration,” she stated. Or if she does, she ensures it isn't recorded for online platforms. “I would never publicly share content in which I openly disparage the government … I believe it's a learned behavior acquired back home.”

The comedian, thirty-nine, resided in Shanghai for almost ten years, departing in 2022. By 2025, she moved to the US. Upon arrival, she dove into an intense period of “revenge bingeing on democracy,” attending lectures, demonstrations, and exploring New York’s library system.

But over the past year after Donald Trump was elected again, there's been a noticeable shift in the environment, she says. “Back home, I understood the boundaries, while in the US I'm standing on unstable ground.”

Her concerns reflect a new climate in the US which many Chinese, or those with experience in the country, perceive as disturbingly familiar. Opponents are ostracised. The leader expects absolute loyalty. Reporters face scrutiny. Institutions come under fire.

Trump has not been shy about his admiration for Xi Jinping, China’s authoritarian figure. He's called Xi as “fantastic”. 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 optimism in the US that improved relations with China may help the rising power become more open, under Trump 2.0, it seems as if America is being pulled in the Chinese direction, rather than the other way around.

“The United States is undergoing an era of cultural revolution,” said a constitutional law expert, a professor at a top Chinese university. “The top leader, Trump, is attempting to mobilise the masses to sideline or weaken established figures … similar to what happened in the country half a century ago.”

Since Trump initiated the so-called a government streamlining body, or Doge, on the Washington bureaucracy early on of his term, many in China have viewed US politics through the lens of the Cultural Revolution. Be it the mobilisation of young people to carry out the leader’s will, or cleansing organizations of perceived enemies, the president as viewed from China has brought Mao-style chaos to the US, albeit without equivalent degrees of violence.

But since the upheaval of the initial period of the new administration has calmed, a new, different kind of climate has settled in the country, which variously seems familiar to many Chinese people.

‘The Beacon Is Dimmer’

The most profound parallel between the US today and China is the suppression on free speech.

A former police officer, turned Chinese Communist party dissenter, found himself in the eye of a storm this year, similar to what he once faced in his homeland. He resided in the US for several years, after escaping China because of harassment from officials.

Last fall, after the death of a public figure, Deng tweeted that the individual was a “scumbag”. Like people across the US – who lost their jobs as a result of expressing criticism regarding him – Deng faced significant backlash. Relatives was doxed and he faced allegations of espionage attempting to create division.

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

Deng’s backlash came from fellow social media users, instead of the state, but that kind of social surveillance bears parallels with the East.

“In terms of going after dissenters and starting to surveil open discourse about issues deemed controversial … It's appearing in the US,” said an academic, an associate professor at a US university. “That’s something that you see in China today as too,” she said, adding that there were now fears in the US of pupils informing against teachers, a type of surveillance promoted by the CCP.

The professor, the legal expert, said that progressive thinkers like himself once turned to America for political inspiration, in part because openly discussing internal affairs in the country is risky. However, “America is no longer some kind of god for Chinese liberals. The US's reputation has declined across the board.”

“We once viewed the US as the beacon of constitutional democracy, but after Trump took power, this lighthouse seems to have become less luminous”.

Chinese liberals, who are often, at least in private, skeptical about China’s political system, are increasingly finding it more acceptable than America’s, Zhang said. “It’s sort of difficult to acknowledge this … but after the pandemic, the government seems to be doing correct policies in environmental protection and promoting EVs and investing in hi-tech,” Zhang said, while “Western nations, as represented by the United States, appear in decline.”

The government's purchase of stakes in US companies has also drawn parallels with China, where the distinction between state and private industry is often blurred.

Recently, the US government announced it will take a shareholder in a new company focused on mineral refinement, following similar stakes in additional firms it considers vital to national security. The deals have made certain stakeholders concerned that the US is entering a fresh phase of government meddling in private industry.

There are still significant distinctions between the US under Trump and the East. In October, multiple media outlets among others refused to sign to a defense department rule that demanded they only report on approved information. US courts have halted or reversed numerous presidential measures, something that would be unthinkable in China’s party-dominated judiciary.

Isaac Stone Fish, 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 currently, and it would remain freer, open, and liberal than the East under its leader.”

The professor observes that while numerous scholars in the country were shocked to see American colleges capitulate to government demands concerning DEI policies and free speech on campus, in the East, leading institutions are publicly controlled inherently. Administrators, which are appointed by the government, “cannot of saying no. They dare not to be disobedient.”

Still, people in the US are starting to adopt measures previously associated with more authoritarian countries. One professor at an American college who was previously outspoken on bilateral matters declined to be interviewed for this piece. He said: “The truth is, I am scared of suppression in the US: I actually feel more comfortable to criticise Xi these days than say anything bad