Trump's United States During Trump's Second Term Seems Strangely Familiar to Observers from China

As the standup comedian, an emerging performer, takes the stage in the Big Apple, she is not just considering what humor to tell. Additionally, she carefully considers which topics to avoid. “I refrain from openly attacking the government,” she stated. And when she does, she makes certain it isn't recorded for social media. “I would never publicly share content where I openly disparage authorities … I believe this is a habit from China.”

Wang, thirty-nine, lived in Shanghai for nearly a decade, leaving in 2022. In 2025, she relocated to the US. Upon arrival, she embarked on a frenzy of “revenge bingeing on democracy,” going to lectures, protests, and exploring the city's library system.

However in the year after Donald Trump was elected again, there has been a noticeable shift in the environment, she notes. “Back home, I knew the boundaries, whereas here I find myself on unstable ground.”

Wang’s fears reflect a new political reality in America which numerous individuals from China, or those with experience in China, find disturbingly familiar. Enemies are ostracised. The leader expects total allegiance. Reporters face scrutiny. Establishments are attacked.

Trump has openly expressed regarding his respect for Xi Jinping, China’s authoritarian figure. He's called him as “fantastic”. When they reached a brief ceasefire in the trade war recently, the bonhomie between the two leaders of countries with diametrically opposed governance models became clear. And after decades of hope in America that closer ties with the East may help the growing nation become more open, in the current administration, it appears as if America is shifting in China's path, rather than the other way around.

“America is undergoing an era of societal upheaval,” said Zhang Qianfan, an academic at a top Chinese university. “The president, Donald Trump, is trying to mobilise the masses in order to marginalize or weaken established figures … reminiscent of events in China decades past.”

Ever since Trump unleashed what's termed a government streamlining body, or the agency, on the Washington bureaucracy early on of his term, numerous Chinese observers have viewed American governance via the perspective of the Cultural Revolution. Whether it is the rallying of the youth to carry out the leader’s will, or cleansing institutions of perceived enemies, the president from a Chinese viewpoint has delivered Mao-style chaos to America, though absent equivalent degrees of force.

But since the upheaval of the early months under Trump has calmed, a new, different kind of political atmosphere has emerged in the country, which in different ways also feels familiar to many Chinese people.

‘The Beacon Has Become Less Bright’

The most profound similarity between the US today and the East is the crackdown on free speech.

Deng Haiyan, now a Chinese Communist party dissenter, ended up in the eye of a storm this year, similar to what he’d only previously experienced in his homeland. Deng resided in America for several years, after escaping China because of harassment from the authorities.

Last fall, after the death of Charlie Kirk, he posted that Kirk was a “scumbag”. Like people nationwide – many of whom were fired as a result of expressing criticism about Kirk – he encountered a huge backlash. Relatives was doxed and he was accused of espionage attempting to divide the US.

“That event surprised me deeply. I hadn't thought such a thing would occur in America – what should only happen in an authoritarian country,” he commented.

Deng’s pile on came from online peers, rather than the state, but that kind of social surveillance bears parallels with China.

“In terms of going after dissenters and monitoring public speech on topics that are sensitive … It's appearing in the US,” said an academic, an associate professor at Georgia State University. “This is that you see in China now as well,” she added, adding that there were now fears in America of students reporting on teachers, a form of surveillance that has been encouraged by the CCP.

The professor, the Peking University law professor, said that progressive thinkers like himself used to look to the US for political inspiration, since openly discussing domestic politics in the country is dangerous. But now, “America isn't some kind of god for progressive Chinese. The US's reputation has worsened generally.”

“We once viewed the US as the symbol of democratic governance, but after Trump took power, that guide appears less luminous”.

Chinese liberals, typically, behind closed doors, critical of the nation's governance, now perceive it less objectionable than America’s, he stated. “It's somewhat difficult to acknowledge this … but after the pandemic, authorities seems to be doing the right thing in environmental protection and promoting EVs and investing in hi-tech,” he noted, while “Western nations, exemplified by the United States, seems to be declining.”

The Trump administration’s purchase of shares in American firms has prompted comparisons with China, where the line between government and business is frequently unclear.

Recently, the US government announced it would become a shareholder in a startup focused on mineral refinement, after taking similar stakes in other companies deemed vital to the country's safety. The deals have left certain stakeholders nervous that America is entering a fresh phase of government meddling in the private sector.

There are still significant distinctions between Trump’s America and China. In October, multiple media outlets including the Guardian declined to agree to a defense department rule that required reporting solely on approved news. US courts have blocked or overturned numerous presidential measures, something that is unthinkable in the nation's party-dominated legal system.

Isaac Stone Fish, who established of Strategy Risks, specializing in China, said: “America could descend into its gravest challenge of all time, orders of magnitudes worse than currently, and it would remain more free, more open, and liberal than China under Xi.”

Zhang notes that while many intellectuals in the country were surprised to see US universities capitulate to government demands concerning DEI policies and open discourse on university grounds, in the East, leading institutions are publicly controlled inherently. University leaders, who are appointed by the government, “cannot refuse. They dare not to be disobedient.”

Nevertheless, Americans are starting to adopt measures previously confined to repressive regimes. An academic at a US university once outspoken on US-China issues declined to speak for this article. He stated: “The truth is, I fear of suppression in the US: I genuinely feel more comfortable to criticise Xi now than say anything bad