The America During the New Administration Feels Oddly Familiar to Observers from the East

When Vickie Wang, an emerging performer, steps onto her platform in the Big Apple, she's not just thinking about what humor to deliver. She also carefully considers which topics to steer clear of. “I refrain from directly criticizing the administration,” she explained. Or if she ventures there, she makes certain it's not captured for online platforms. “I'd never publicly share material in which I directly criticize authorities … I believe it's a habit from China.”

Wang, 39, lived in Shanghai for almost a decade, leaving in 2022. In 2025, she moved to America. When she got there, she dove into a frenzy of “revenge bingeing on freedom,” attending lectures, protests, and exploring the city's library system.

But over the past year since Donald Trump returned to office for the second time, there has been a “palpable change” in the atmosphere, she notes. “In China, I understood where the line was, whereas here I'm standing on unstable ground.”

Her fears reflect an emerging political reality in the US which numerous individuals from China, or people with experience in the country, find disturbingly similar. Opponents are ostracised. The leader demands absolute loyalty. Reporters face scrutiny. Establishments are attacked.

The president has openly expressed regarding his respect for China's leader, China’s authoritarian figure. He's called him as “fantastic”. As they agreed a brief ceasefire in economic tensions on Thursday, the bonhomie between the two leaders of countries with vastly different political systems became clear. Following years of hope in America that closer ties with China may help the growing nation become more open, in the current administration, it seems as if the US is being pulled in China's path, instead of the other way around.

“America is experiencing a period of societal upheaval,” stated Zhang Qianfan, an academic at Peking University. “The president, Trump, is attempting to rally the grassroots in order to marginalize or weaken the elite … similar to events in the country half a century ago.”

Since the administration unleashed the so-called a government streamlining body, or the agency, on federal institutions at the start in office, many in China have viewed American governance via the perspective of China's historical period. Be it the mobilisation of the youth to execute presidential directives, or purging institutions of perceived enemies, the president as viewed from China has brought Mao-style chaos to America, though absent the same levels of force.

However since the turmoil of the initial period of the new administration has calmed, a new, different kind of climate has settled in the country, which in different ways also feels recognizable to numerous Chinese people.

‘The Lighthouse Has Become Less Bright’

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

A former police officer, now a CCP dissenter, ended up in the eye of a storm this year, the likes of which he’d only previously experienced in China. He resided in the US since 2019, having fled the country because of pressure from officials.

Last fall, following the passing of Charlie Kirk, he posted that Kirk was a “scumbag”. Like people across the US – many of whom were fired for expressing criticism regarding him – Deng faced significant backlash. Relatives had personal info leaked and he was accused of espionage seeking to divide the US.

“That event was a real shock. I never imagined such a thing could happen in America – something that should only happen in an authoritarian country,” Deng said.

Deng’s pile on came from online peers, rather than the state, but such of social surveillance also has similarities with the East.

“Regarding going after those who disagree and starting to surveil open discourse about issues deemed controversial … That’s starting to emerge here,” noted Maria Repnikova, an associate professor at a US university. “That’s something observed in China now as well,” she added, stating that there were now fears in the US of students reporting on teachers, a form of monitoring that has been encouraged by the CCP.

Zhang, the legal expert, said that liberal Chinese intellectuals like himself used to look to America for ideals, in part because openly discussing domestic politics in China is risky. But now, “The US isn't some kind of ideal for Chinese liberals. The US's reputation has worsened generally.”

“We once viewed the US as the beacon of constitutional democracy, but since the new administration, this lighthouse seems to have become dimmer”.

Chinese liberals, typically, at least in private, skeptical about the nation's governance, are increasingly finding it less objectionable than the US's, he stated. “It's somewhat difficult to acknowledge this … but after the pandemic, the government seems to be doing the right thing in improving the environment and promoting EVs and tech investment,” he noted, while “Western nations, as represented by the United States, appear declining.”

The government's purchase of shares in American firms has prompted comparisons with China, where the distinction between government and business is often blurred.

On Monday, the US government announced it will take a shareholder in a startup specialising in mineral refinement, following comparable shares in other companies it considers vital to the country's safety. These moves have left some investors nervous that the US is embarking on a new era of government meddling in private industry.

There are still significant distinctions between Trump’s America and China. In October, several news organisations including the Guardian declined to agree to a Pentagon policy that required they only report on government-authorised information. US courts have blocked or reversed many of Trump’s actions, an action that would be unthinkable in the nation's party-dominated legal system.

Isaac Stone Fish, the founder of Strategy Risks, a China-focused advisory firm, commented: “America might face its gravest challenge of its history, orders of magnitudes worse than it is now, and it would remain more free, open, and liberal than China under Xi.”

The professor observes that while many intellectuals in the country were shocked to see US universities capitulate to official requests regarding DEI policies and open discourse on campus, in China, the top universities are publicly controlled inherently. Administrators, which are selected by the government, “have no liberty of saying no. They dare not defy orders.”

Still, Americans are beginning to take precautions previously associated with repressive regimes. An academic at a US university once vocal on bilateral matters declined to speak for this piece. He said: “Honestly, I fear of suppression in the US: I actually feel less afraid to criticise Xi these days than say anything bad