As the standup comedian, an emerging comedic talent, steps onto the stage in the Big Apple, she's not just considering what humor to tell. Additionally, she weighs which topics to steer clear of. “I refrain from directly attacking the administration,” she explained. And when she does, she ensures it's not recorded for social media. “I'd never publicly share material where I directly criticize authorities … I think this is a learned behavior acquired back home.”
The comedian, thirty-nine, lived in Shanghai for almost ten years, leaving in 2022. In 2025, she relocated to the US. When she got there, she dove into an intense period of “overindulging on democracy,” attending lectures, protests, and exploring the city's library system.
However over the past year after the president returned to office again, there has been a “palpable change” in the environment, she says. “Back home, I understood the boundaries, while in the US I'm standing on shifting sands.”
Wang’s fears mirror a new political reality in the US which many Chinese, or those who have lived in the country, find disturbingly similar. Opponents are ostracised. The president demands total allegiance. Reporters are targeted. Institutions come under fire.
The president has openly expressed regarding his respect for Xi Jinping, the nation's authoritarian figure. He has described him as “fantastic”. As they agreed a brief ceasefire in economic tensions on Thursday, the bonhomie between both figures of nations with vastly different governance models was evident. Following years of hope in America that improved relations with China may help the growing nation become more open, in the current administration, it seems as if America is shifting in the Chinese direction, rather than vice versa.
“America is undergoing an era of cultural revolution,” stated a constitutional law expert, a professor at a top Chinese university. “The president, Donald Trump, is attempting to rally the masses to marginalize or weaken established figures … similar to events in the country decades past.”
Since Trump unleashed the so-called a government streamlining body, or Doge, on the Washington bureaucracy at the start in office, many in China have viewed US politics through the lens of the Cultural Revolution. Whether it is the mobilisation of young people to execute the leader’s will, or cleansing organizations of those deemed opposition, Trump from a Chinese viewpoint has brought disorder reminiscent of Mao to the US, though absent the same levels of force.
However after the upheaval of the initial period under Trump subsided, an unfamiliar, different kind of climate has emerged in the country, which variously also feels familiar to many Chinese people.
‘The Beacon Has Become Less Bright’
The deepest similarity between Trump’s America and the East is the crackdown on free speech.
Deng Haiyan, turned Chinese Communist party dissenter, found himself in a controversy recently, the likes of which he’d only previously experienced in China. Deng has lived in America since 2019, after escaping China because of pressure from officials.
In September, following the passing of Charlie Kirk, Deng tweeted that the individual was “despicable”. Like people across the US – who were fired as a result of expressing criticism about Kirk – Deng faced a huge backlash. His family was doxed and he was accused of being a Chinese spy attempting to divide the US.
“This incident surprised me deeply. I hadn't thought such a thing could happen in the United States – what typically happens in a repressive state,” he commented.
Deng’s pile on came from fellow social media users, instead of the state, but such of public monitoring also has similarities with China.
“Regarding targeting dissenters and monitoring public speech on topics deemed controversial … It's appearing in the US,” noted Maria Repnikova, an associate professor at Georgia State University. “That’s something that you see in China today as well,” she added, adding that there were now fears in America of students reporting on educators, a form of surveillance promoted by Chinese authorities.
Zhang, the Peking University law professor, said that liberal Chinese intellectuals such as him once turned to America for ideals, in part because public debate on domestic politics in the country is dangerous. However, “America isn't some kind of ideal for progressive Chinese. America’s image has declined generally.”
“We used to see America as the symbol of democratic governance, but after Trump took power, that guide appears dimmer”.
Chinese liberals, who are often, at least in private, skeptical about China’s political system, are increasingly finding it less objectionable than America’s, Zhang said. “It’s sort of difficult to acknowledge this reality … but after the pandemic, authorities seems to be doing the right thing in environmental protection and promoting EVs and investing in hi-tech,” Zhang said, while “Western nations, as represented by America, seems to be in decline.”
The government's purchase of shares in US companies has prompted comparisons with the East, where the line between government and private industry is frequently unclear.
Recently, authorities announced it would become an investor in a startup specialising in rare earth processing, following similar stakes in additional firms deemed essential for the country's safety. These moves have left certain stakeholders nervous that America is entering a new era of state intervention in private industry.
There are still significant distinctions between Trump’s America and China. In October, multiple media outlets among others refused to sign to a defense department rule that demanded they only report on approved news. US courts have halted or overturned many of presidential measures, an action that would be impossible in China’s party-dominated legal system.
Isaac Stone Fish, the founder of Strategy Risks, a China-focused advisory firm, said: “America might face its gravest challenge of all time, orders of magnitudes worse than currently, and it will still be freer, open, and more liberal than the East under its leader.”
Zhang notes that while numerous scholars in the country were surprised to see American colleges capitulate to government demands regarding diversity and inclusion practices and free speech on university grounds, in the East, leading institutions are all state-owned inherently. Administrators, which are appointed by the government, “have no liberty refuse. They dare not to be disobedient.”
Nevertheless, Americans are starting to take precautions previously associated with more authoritarian countries. One professor at an American college once vocal on US-China issues refused to speak for this article. He stated: “The truth is, I am scared of the censorship in the US: I genuinely feel more comfortable to criticise Xi now than say anything bad
