Trump's America Under the New Administration Seems Strangely Recognizable to Those Watching from the East

When Vickie Wang, a rising performer, steps onto her platform in New York, she's not just thinking about which jokes to deliver. She also carefully considers which topics to steer clear of. “I refrain from openly attacking the government,” she explained. And when she ventures there, she makes certain it's not recorded for social media. “I'd never publicly share material in which I openly disparage the government … I believe it's a learned behavior acquired back home.”

Wang, thirty-nine, lived in Shanghai for nearly ten years, leaving in 2022. By 2025, she relocated to the US. When she got there, she embarked on a frenzy of “overindulging on democracy,” going to talks, demonstrations, and exploring the city's library system.

But over the past year after the president returned to office again, there has been a “palpable change” in the atmosphere, she says. “Back home, I understood where the line was, whereas here I find myself on unstable ground.”

Her concerns reflect a new political reality in the US which many Chinese, or people who have lived in China, find eerily similar. Opponents face exclusion. The leader expects absolute loyalty. Reporters are targeted. Institutions are attacked.

The president has not been shy about his admiration for China's leader, China’s strongman leader. He's called him as “fantastic”. As they agreed a temporary truce in the trade war on Thursday, the camaraderie between the two leaders of countries with vastly different political systems was evident. And after decades of optimism in the US that improved relations with China may help the rising power to liberalise, in the current administration, it appears that the US is being pulled in the Chinese direction, instead of the other way around.

“The United States is experiencing a period of societal upheaval,” said Zhang Qianfan, an academic at a top Chinese university. “The president, Trump, is trying to rally the grassroots to sideline or undermine established figures … reminiscent of what happened in China decades past.”

Ever since Trump initiated the so-called Department for Government Efficiency, or Doge, on federal institutions at the start in office, numerous Chinese observers have viewed US politics via the perspective of China's historical period. Be it the rallying of the youth to execute the leader’s will, or cleansing organizations of those deemed opposition, Trump from a Chinese viewpoint has delivered disorder reminiscent of Mao to America, though without equivalent degrees of force.

But after the upheaval of the early months of the new administration subsided, a new, different kind of political atmosphere has emerged in the country, which variously seems familiar to many Chinese individuals.

‘The Lighthouse Has Become Less Bright’

The deepest parallel between the US today and China is the suppression on open expression.

A former police officer, now a CCP critic, found himself in the eye of a storm this year, similar to what he’d only previously experienced in China. He has lived in America since 2019, having fled China due to pressure from the authorities.

Last fall, following the passing of Charlie Kirk, he posted that Kirk was a “scumbag”. Similar to others across the US – many of whom were fired as a result of making negative comments regarding him – he encountered a huge backlash. Relatives was doxed and he was accused of being a Chinese spy attempting to divide the US.

“This incident was a real shock. I never imagined such a thing could happen in America – what should only happen in a repressive state,” he commented.

His backlash came from fellow social media users, rather than the state, but such of social surveillance also has similarities with the East.

“Regarding targeting those who disagree and starting to surveil open discourse on topics that are sensitive … It's appearing here,” said 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 pupils informing against educators, a form of surveillance that has been encouraged by the CCP.

Zhang, the Peking University law professor, said that liberal Chinese intellectuals such as him once turned to America for political inspiration, since openly discussing internal affairs in the country is dangerous. However, “America is no longer a god for Chinese liberals. The US's reputation has declined across the board.”

“We once viewed the US as the symbol of constitutional democracy, but after Trump took power, this lighthouse appears dimmer”.

Chinese liberals, typically, at least in private, critical of the nation's governance, now perceive it more acceptable than the US's, Zhang said. “It's somewhat difficult to acknowledge this … but after the pandemic, authorities appears to be pursuing the right thing in environmental protection and promoting EVs and tech investment,” he noted, while “the West, as represented by the United States, appear declining.”

The Trump administration’s purchase of shares in US companies has also drawn comparisons with the East, where the distinction between state and private industry is often blurred.

On Monday, the US government stated it will take a shareholder in a startup focused on rare earth processing, following comparable shares in additional firms it considers vital to the country's safety. The deals have left some investors nervous that the US is embarking on a new era of government meddling in the private sector.

Yet, there remain significant distinctions between the US under Trump and China. Last month, multiple media outlets including the Guardian declined to agree to a Pentagon policy that required they only report on government-authorised news. American judiciary have blocked or reversed numerous Trump’s actions, an action that is unthinkable in the nation's CCP-controlled legal system.

An analyst, who established of a consulting firm, specializing in China, said: “The United States could descend into the worst crisis of all time, far more severe than currently, and it will still be more free, open, and liberal than the East under its leader.”

The professor observes that although many intellectuals in the country were shocked to see US universities yield to government demands concerning DEI policies and open discourse on campus, in China, the top universities are publicly controlled inherently. University leaders, which are selected by the state, “cannot refuse. They dare not to be disobedient.”

Still, Americans are starting to adopt measures previously associated with more authoritarian countries. One professor at a US university who was previously vocal on bilateral matters refused to speak for this piece. He stated: “Honestly, I am scared of the censorship in the US: I genuinely feel more comfortable criticizing China's leader these days than say anything bad