The United States Under the New Administration Feels Oddly Recognizable to Those Watching from the East

When Vickie Wang, a rising comedic talent, takes the stage in New York, she is not only considering which jokes to tell. Additionally, she weighs which topics to steer clear of. “I refrain from openly criticizing the administration,” she explained. Or if she does, she makes certain it's not recorded for online platforms. “I would never publish openly content in which I directly criticize authorities … I believe it's a habit acquired back home.”

Wang, 39, lived in the Chinese metropolis for almost a decade, leaving in 2022. In 2025, she moved to the US. Upon arrival, she embarked on an intense period of “overindulging on democracy,” attending lectures, demonstrations, and delving into the city's library system.

However over the past year since the president returned to office for the second time, there has been a noticeable shift in the environment, she notes. “Back home, I knew the boundaries, while in the US I'm standing on unstable ground.”

Wang’s fears reflect an emerging political reality in the US which many Chinese, or those with experience in China, perceive as eerily familiar. Enemies are ostracised. The leader demands absolute loyalty. Reporters face scrutiny. Establishments are attacked.

Trump has openly expressed regarding his respect for China's leader, China’s strongman leader. He has described him as “fantastic”. As they agreed a temporary truce in economic tensions recently, the bonhomie between both figures of nations with diametrically opposed governance models became clear. Following years of hope in the US that closer ties with China could assist the rising power become more open, under Trump 2.0, it appears that America is being pulled in China's path, instead of vice versa.

“The United States is experiencing an era of cultural revolution,” said Zhang Qianfan, an academic at Peking University. “The top leader, Donald Trump, is trying to mobilise the grassroots in order to marginalize or weaken established figures … similar to what happened in the country half a century ago.”

Ever since the administration unleashed the so-called a government streamlining body, or Doge, on federal institutions at the start of his term, many in China have viewed US politics via the perspective of the Cultural Revolution. Whether it is the mobilisation of young people to execute the leader’s will, or purging organizations of perceived enemies, the president from a Chinese viewpoint has delivered Mao-style chaos to America, though without the same levels of force.

But after the upheaval of the initial period of the new administration has calmed, an unfamiliar, different kind of political atmosphere has settled in the US, which in different ways seems recognizable to numerous Chinese people.

‘The Lighthouse Is Less Bright’

The most profound similarity between the US today and the East is the crackdown on open expression.

Deng Haiyan, now a CCP critic, ended up in a controversy recently, the likes of which he’d only previously experienced in China. He has lived in the US since 2019, after escaping China because of harassment from officials.

In September, after the death of a public figure, he posted that the individual was a “scumbag”. Similar to others nationwide – many of whom were fired as a result of expressing criticism regarding him – he encountered significant backlash. Relatives had personal info leaked and he faced allegations of being a Chinese spy seeking to divide the US.

“That event surprised me deeply. I never imagined that something like this would occur in America – something that should only happen in an authoritarian country,” Deng said.

His backlash came from fellow social media users, rather than the state, but that kind of public monitoring also has parallels with China.

“In terms of going after dissenters and starting to surveil open discourse on topics deemed controversial … That’s starting to emerge here,” noted an academic, an associate professor at a US university. “That’s something observed in the East now as well,” she added, adding that there were now fears in the US of students reporting on teachers, a form of monitoring promoted by the CCP.

The professor, the legal expert, said that progressive thinkers like himself used to look to America for ideals, since public debate on internal affairs in China is risky. However, “The US is no longer a god for Chinese liberals. The US's reputation has declined generally.”

“We once viewed America as the beacon of constitutional democracy, but after Trump took power, this lighthouse appears less luminous”.

Progressive Chinese, who are often, behind closed doors, skeptical about the nation's governance, now perceive it less objectionable than the US's, he stated. “It’s sort of painful to accept this reality … but post-COVID, the government seems to be doing the right thing in environmental protection and promoting EVs and tech investment,” Zhang said, while “Western nations, exemplified by America, seems to be declining.”

The Trump administration’s purchase of shares in US companies has prompted parallels with China, where the line between state and private industry is frequently unclear.

On Monday, authorities stated it would become a shareholder in a new company specialising in mineral refinement, after taking similar stakes in additional firms deemed essential for the country's safety. These moves have left certain stakeholders nervous that the US is entering a new era of state intervention in the private sector.

There are still significant distinctions between the US under Trump and the East. Last month, multiple media outlets including the Guardian refused to sign to a Pentagon policy that demanded they only report on government-authorised news. American judiciary have blocked or overturned numerous Trump’s actions, an action that would be unthinkable in the nation's CCP-controlled legal system.

An analyst, who established of Strategy Risks, a China-focused advisory firm, said: “America might face the worst crisis of all time, orders of magnitudes worse than it is now, and it would remain freer, more open, and liberal than the East under its leader.”

The professor notes that while many intellectuals in the country were shocked to see American colleges yield to official requests regarding DEI policies and open discourse on campus, in the East, leading institutions are publicly controlled inherently. University leaders, who are selected by the government, “cannot of saying no. They can’t afford defy orders.”

Nevertheless, people in the US are starting to take precautions that were once associated with more authoritarian countries. An academic at a US university who was previously vocal 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