Trump's United States During the New Administration Feels Strangely Recognizable to Observers from the East

When Vickie Wang, an emerging comedic talent, steps onto the stage in the Big Apple, she's not only thinking about which jokes to tell. She also weighs which topics to steer clear of. “I don't engage in directly attacking the administration,” she explained. And when she ventures there, she makes certain it's not recorded for social media. “I would never publicly share material in which I directly criticize the government … I believe this is a learned behavior acquired back home.”

The comedian, 39, lived in Shanghai for almost a decade, leaving in 2022. By 2025, she moved to the US. When she got there, she dove into an intense period of “overindulging on democracy,” going to lectures, protests, and exploring New York’s library system.

But over the past year since Donald Trump was elected for the second time, there has been a “palpable change” in the atmosphere, she notes. “Back home, I knew where the line was, while here I'm standing on shifting sands.”

Her concerns mirror an emerging political reality in the US which many Chinese, or people with experience in China, perceive as disturbingly similar. Enemies face exclusion. The president demands total allegiance. Reporters face scrutiny. Establishments are attacked.

Trump has openly expressed about his admiration for Xi Jinping, the nation's strongman leader. He's called Xi as a “great guy”. When they reached a brief ceasefire in economic tensions recently, the bonhomie between both figures of countries with diametrically opposed governance models was evident. And after decades of optimism in America that improved relations with the East could assist the growing nation become more open, in the current administration, it seems as if America is shifting in China's path, instead of the other way around.

“The United States is experiencing a period of societal upheaval,” said a constitutional law expert, an academic at Peking University. “The top leader, Trump, is trying to mobilise the masses in order to marginalize or undermine established figures … reminiscent of events in the country decades past.”

Ever since the administration initiated what's termed a government streamlining body, or Doge, on the Washington bureaucracy early on of his term, many in China see American governance via the perspective of China's historical period. Whether it is the rallying of young people to execute the leader’s will, or cleansing institutions of perceived enemies, the president as viewed from China has brought disorder reminiscent of Mao to America, though absent the same levels of violence.

However since the turmoil of the initial period of the new administration subsided, a new, distinct type of political atmosphere has emerged in the US, which in different ways seems familiar to numerous Chinese individuals.

‘The Lighthouse Has Become Less Bright’

The deepest parallel between the US today and the East is the crackdown on open expression.

Deng Haiyan, turned Chinese Communist party critic, found himself in a controversy this year, similar to what he’d only previously experienced in China. Deng resided in America since 2019, after escaping the country because of pressure from officials.

Last fall, after the death of a public figure, Deng tweeted that Kirk was “despicable”. Like people nationwide – many of whom lost their jobs as a result of expressing criticism about Kirk – 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 never imagined that something like this could happen in the United States – what typically happens in an authoritarian country,” Deng said.

Deng’s pile on originated from online peers, rather than the state, but that kind of public monitoring bears similarities with China.

“Regarding going after dissenters and monitoring public speech about issues deemed controversial … It's appearing here,” said an academic, a scholar at Georgia State University. “That’s something observed in the East today as too,” she added, adding that there were now fears in America of students reporting on educators, a type of surveillance that has been encouraged by the CCP.

The professor, the Peking University law professor, said that liberal Chinese intellectuals like himself once turned to America for political inspiration, since public debate on internal affairs in the country is dangerous. But now, “America is no longer some kind of god for Chinese liberals. The US's reputation has declined generally.”

“We used to see the US as the symbol of constitutional democracy, but since the new administration, this lighthouse seems to have become less luminous”.

Progressive Chinese, who are often, behind closed doors, critical of China’s political system, are increasingly finding it more acceptable than America’s, he stated. “It’s sort of painful to accept this reality … but after the pandemic, authorities appears to be pursuing correct policies in improving the environment and developing electric cars and investing in hi-tech,” he noted, while “Western nations, exemplified by the United States, appear declining.”

The government's acquisition of shares in US companies has also drawn comparisons with the East, where the line between government and business is frequently unclear.

On Monday, authorities stated it would become a shareholder in a startup focused on mineral refinement, following similar stakes in other companies it considers essential for national security. These moves have made certain stakeholders concerned that America is entering a fresh phase of government meddling in the private sector.

Yet, there remain significant distinctions between Trump’s America and China. Last month, several news organisations 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 Trump’s actions, something that would be impossible in the nation's party-dominated legal system.

Isaac Stone Fish, who established of Strategy Risks, a China-focused advisory firm, said: “America could descend into its gravest challenge of all time, orders of magnitudes worse than it is now, and it will still be freer, open, and liberal than China under Xi.”

The professor observes that while numerous scholars in China were surprised to see American colleges capitulate to government demands regarding diversity and inclusion practices and open discourse on university grounds, in the East, the top universities are publicly controlled by default. University leaders, who are appointed by the government, “have no liberty of saying no. They dare not defy orders.”

Still, people in the US are starting to take precautions that were once confined to repressive regimes. An academic at a US university who was previously vocal on US-China issues declined to speak for this article. He said: “Honestly, I am scared of suppression in the US: I genuinely feel more comfortable criticizing China's leader now than say anything bad