As the standup comedian, an emerging comedic talent, takes the stage in the Big Apple, she's not just considering which jokes to deliver. She also weighs what subjects to steer clear of. “I refrain from directly attacking the administration,” she explained. Or if she does, she makes certain it isn't captured for online platforms. “I'd never publish openly content in which I directly criticize authorities … I think this is a learned behavior acquired back home.”
The comedian, thirty-nine, resided in the Chinese metropolis 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,” attending lectures, protests, and exploring New York’s public library.
However over the past year after Donald Trump was elected for the second time, there has been a “palpable change” in the atmosphere, she notes. “Back home, I understood the boundaries, whereas here I'm standing on unstable ground.”
Her fears reflect a new political reality in the US which many Chinese, or those who have lived in the country, find eerily similar. Enemies are ostracised. The president demands total allegiance. Journalists are targeted. Institutions come under fire.
The president has not been shy regarding his respect for China's leader, China’s authoritarian figure. He's called him as “fantastic”. As they agreed a temporary truce in economic tensions recently, the camaraderie between the two leaders of countries with vastly different governance models became clear. Following years of optimism in the US that closer ties with China may help the rising power to liberalise, in the current administration, it seems as if America is shifting in the Chinese direction, instead of vice versa.
“The United States is experiencing an era of cultural revolution,” stated a constitutional law expert, a professor at Peking University. “The top leader, Trump, is attempting to mobilise the masses in order to marginalize or undermine established figures … similar to events in the country half a century ago.”
Since Trump unleashed the so-called a government streamlining body, or Doge, on federal institutions early on of his term, numerous Chinese observers see US politics through the lens of the Cultural Revolution. Whether it is the rallying of young people to carry out presidential directives, or purging organizations of those deemed opposition, the president from a Chinese viewpoint has delivered disorder reminiscent of Mao to America, albeit absent the same levels of violence.
However since the turmoil of the early months under Trump subsided, a new, different kind of climate has settled in the country, which variously seems familiar to many Chinese people.
‘The Beacon Has Become Less Bright’
The deepest parallel between the US today and China is the crackdown on free speech.
Deng Haiyan, now a CCP dissenter, ended up in a controversy this year, the likes of which he’d only previously experienced in his homeland. He resided in America since 2019, having fled the country because of harassment from the authorities.
In September, following the passing of Charlie Kirk, Deng tweeted that Kirk was “despicable”. Like people nationwide – many of whom lost their jobs for expressing criticism regarding him – he encountered significant backlash. His family was doxed and he faced allegations of espionage attempting to create division.
“This incident was a real shock. I hadn't thought that something like this could happen in America – something that should only happen in an authoritarian country,” he commented.
His backlash originated from online peers, rather than the government, but such of social surveillance also has parallels with the East.
“Regarding going after dissenters and monitoring open discourse on topics that are sensitive … It's appearing in the US,” noted an academic, a scholar at a US university. “This is that you see in the East now as too,” she said, stating that concerns are rising in the US of pupils informing against teachers, a form of monitoring that has been encouraged by Chinese authorities.
Zhang, the Peking University law professor, said that liberal Chinese intellectuals such as him used to look to America for ideals, since openly discussing domestic politics in China is dangerous. But now, “The US is no longer a god for Chinese liberals. The US's reputation has worsened across the board.”
“We once viewed America as the beacon of democratic governance, but after Trump took power, that guide seems to have become dimmer”.
Chinese liberals, typically, behind closed doors, critical of the nation's governance, are increasingly finding it less objectionable than America’s, Zhang said. “It’s sort of difficult to acknowledge this … but after the pandemic, authorities appears to be pursuing the right thing in environmental protection and developing electric cars and investing in hi-tech,” Zhang said, while “the West, exemplified by America, seems to be in decline.”
The Trump administration’s purchase of stakes in US companies has also drawn comparisons with the East, where the line between government and business is often blurred.
On Monday, authorities announced it will take a shareholder in a startup specialising in rare earth processing, following similar stakes in additional firms deemed vital to national security. The deals have left certain stakeholders concerned that America is embarking on a fresh phase of government meddling in private industry.
There are still major differences between Trump’s America and China. Last month, several news organisations including the Guardian declined to agree to a defense department rule that demanded reporting solely on government-authorised information. American judiciary have blocked or overturned many of Trump’s actions, an action that is impossible in China’s CCP-controlled legal system.
An analyst, the founder of a consulting firm, specializing in China, said: “America could descend into the worst crisis of all time, orders of magnitudes worse than currently, and it will still be more free, more open, and more liberal than China under Xi.”
Zhang observes that while many intellectuals in China were surprised to see American colleges capitulate to official requests regarding diversity and inclusion practices and open discourse on campus, in the East, the top universities are all state-owned inherently. University leaders, which are appointed by the government, “cannot refuse. They can’t afford defy orders.”
Nevertheless, people in the US are beginning to take precautions that were once confined to more authoritarian countries. An academic at a US university who was previously outspoken on US-China issues refused to speak for this article. He said: “Honestly, I am scared of the censorship in the US: I actually feel less afraid to criticise Xi now than say anything bad