The America During Trump's Second Term Seems Strangely Familiar to Observers from China

As Vickie Wang, an emerging performer, steps onto the stage in the Big Apple, she's not only considering what humor to deliver. Additionally, she weighs what subjects to steer clear of. “I refrain from openly criticizing the administration,” she explained. And when she ventures there, she ensures it isn't captured for online platforms. “I would never publish openly material where I directly criticize the government … I believe it's a learned behavior acquired back home.”

Wang, 39, resided in Shanghai for nearly ten years, departing in that year. By 2025, she moved to America. When she got there, she embarked on a frenzy of “revenge bingeing on democracy,” going to talks, protests, and delving into the city's library system.

But over the past year after Donald Trump was elected again, there has been a “palpable change” in the environment, she says. “In China, I understood where the line was, while here I find myself on shifting sands.”

Wang’s concerns reflect an emerging political reality in the US which many Chinese, or people with experience in China, find eerily familiar. Opponents are ostracised. The leader demands absolute loyalty. Journalists are targeted. Establishments are attacked.

The president has openly expressed regarding his respect for Xi Jinping, China’s strongman leader. He's called Xi as a “great guy”. When they reached a temporary truce in the trade war recently, the camaraderie between the two leaders of nations with vastly different political systems became clear. Following years of hope in the US that improved relations with China could assist the growing nation become more open, under Trump 2.0, it seems that the US is shifting in China's path, rather than vice versa.

“America is experiencing an era of cultural revolution,” stated Zhang Qianfan, an academic at Peking University. “The president, Trump, is trying to mobilise the grassroots to sideline or weaken established figures … similar to what happened in China decades past.”

Ever since Trump initiated the so-called a government streamlining body, or the agency, on the Washington bureaucracy at the start in office, numerous Chinese observers see American governance via the perspective of China's historical period. Be it the mobilisation of young people to carry out the leader’s will, or cleansing organizations of perceived enemies, the president from a Chinese viewpoint has brought Mao-style chaos to the US, albeit without equivalent degrees of force.

But since the upheaval of the early months under Trump has calmed, a new, different kind of climate has emerged in the US, which variously seems familiar to many Chinese individuals.

‘The Lighthouse Has Become Dimmer’

The deepest similarity between Trump’s America 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 recently, similar to what he once faced in his homeland. He has lived in the US since 2019, after escaping China because of pressure from the authorities.

Last fall, following the passing of a public figure, he posted that Kirk was “despicable”. Similar to others across the US – many of whom were fired as a result of expressing criticism regarding him – Deng faced significant backlash. His family was doxed and he was accused of espionage seeking to divide the US.

“This incident surprised me deeply. I never imagined that something like this would occur in America – something that typically happens in an authoritarian country,” Deng said.

His pile on came from fellow social media users, instead of the government, but that kind of public monitoring bears parallels with China.

“Regarding going after dissenters and starting to surveil public speech about issues deemed controversial … It's appearing here,” noted an academic, a scholar at Georgia State University. “That’s something that you see in China today as too,” she added, stating that concerns are rising in America of pupils informing against teachers, a form of monitoring promoted by the CCP.

Zhang, the legal expert, said that progressive thinkers like himself once turned to America for ideals, since openly discussing internal affairs in China is risky. But now, “The US is no longer some kind of ideal for progressive Chinese. The US's reputation has worsened generally.”

“We once viewed America as the symbol of constitutional democracy, but since the new administration, that guide appears dimmer”.

Progressive Chinese, typically, behind closed doors, skeptical about the nation's governance, are increasingly finding it more acceptable than America’s, Zhang said. “It's somewhat difficult to acknowledge this reality … but post-COVID, authorities appears to be pursuing the right thing in environmental protection and developing electric cars and tech investment,” Zhang said, while “the West, as represented by the United States, appear in decline.”

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

Recently, authorities announced it will take an investor in a startup focused on rare earth processing, following similar stakes in other companies it considers 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.

Yet, there remain major differences between the US under Trump and China. In October, multiple media outlets among others refused to sign to a Pentagon policy that demanded they only report on government-authorised news. American judiciary have halted or reversed many of Trump’s actions, something that is impossible in China’s party-dominated legal system.

An analyst, the founder of Strategy Risks, specializing in China, commented: “The United States could descend into its gravest challenge of its history, orders of magnitudes worse than currently, and it would remain freer, more open, and liberal than the East under its leader.”

Zhang notes that while numerous scholars in the country were surprised to see US universities yield to official requests regarding diversity and inclusion practices and open discourse on campus, in the East, leading institutions are all state-owned by default. Administrators, which are appointed by the government, “cannot refuse. They can’t afford defy orders.”

Nevertheless, people in the US are starting to adopt measures previously associated with repressive regimes. One professor at a US university who was previously vocal on US-China issues refused to be interviewed for this article. He said: “Honestly, I am scared of the censorship in the US: I genuinely feel less afraid criticizing China's leader now than say anything bad