The America During Trump's Second Term Feels Oddly Recognizable to Those Watching from the East

As Vickie Wang, a rising performer, steps onto her platform in the Big Apple, she is not only considering which jokes to tell. Additionally, she carefully considers what subjects to avoid. “I refrain from directly attacking the administration,” she stated. Or if she does, she ensures it isn't recorded for online platforms. “I would never publish openly material where I directly criticize authorities … I believe this is a habit from China.”

The comedian, 39, lived in the Chinese metropolis for nearly ten years, leaving in that year. By 2025, she moved to America. When she got there, she dove into a frenzy of “overindulging on democracy,” going to lectures, protests, and exploring the city's public library.

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 says. “Back home, I knew where the line was, whereas here I'm standing on unstable ground.”

Her fears reflect a new political reality in the US which many Chinese, or people who have lived in the country, find disturbingly similar. Enemies face exclusion. The president expects total allegiance. Journalists face scrutiny. Establishments are attacked.

The president has not been shy regarding his respect for Xi Jinping, China’s strongman leader. He has described Xi as “fantastic”. When they reached a temporary truce in the trade war recently, the bonhomie between the two leaders of countries with vastly different governance models was evident. And after decades of hope in America that closer ties with China may help the growing nation to liberalise, in the current administration, it seems as if the US is being pulled in the Chinese direction, instead of vice versa.

“The United States is undergoing an era of societal upheaval,” said a constitutional law expert, an academic at Peking University. “The top leader, Trump, is attempting to rally the masses in order to marginalize or undermine established figures … similar to what happened in the country decades past.”

Since Trump initiated what's termed Department for Government Efficiency, or Doge, on federal institutions early on of his term, many in China see American governance through the lens of the Cultural Revolution. Be it the mobilisation of the youth to carry out the leader’s will, or cleansing institutions of those deemed opposition, Trump from a Chinese viewpoint has delivered Mao-style chaos to America, albeit without equivalent degrees of force.

But since the upheaval of the early months under Trump has calmed, a new, distinct type of political atmosphere has emerged in the US, which variously seems recognizable to numerous Chinese people.

‘The Lighthouse Has Become Dimmer’

The most profound similarity between Trump’s America and China is the suppression on open expression.

A former police officer, now a CCP dissenter, found himself in the eye of a storm recently, the likes of which he’d only previously experienced in his homeland. Deng resided in America since 2019, after escaping China due to pressure from the authorities.

In September, following the passing of Charlie Kirk, he posted that Kirk was a “scumbag”. Similar to others across the US – many of whom lost their jobs as a result of expressing criticism about Kirk – Deng faced significant backlash. His family had personal info leaked and he faced allegations of espionage attempting to create division.

“That event was a real shock. I hadn't thought such a thing would occur in America – something that should only happen in an authoritarian country,” Deng said.

His pile on came from fellow social media users, rather than the government, but such of social surveillance also has parallels with China.

“In terms of going after dissenters and starting to surveil open discourse about issues that are sensitive … It's appearing in the US,” said Maria Repnikova, an associate professor at Georgia State University. “That’s something that you see in the East today as too,” she said, adding that there were now fears in the US of students reporting on teachers, a form of surveillance promoted by the CCP.

The professor, the Peking University law professor, said that liberal Chinese intellectuals like himself used to look to America for political inspiration, since public debate on internal affairs in China is risky. But now, “The US is no longer some kind of ideal for progressive Chinese. America’s image has declined across the board.”

“We used to see America as the beacon of constitutional democracy, but after Trump took power, this lighthouse appears less luminous”.

Chinese liberals, typically, behind closed doors, critical of China’s political system, are increasingly finding it less objectionable than America’s, he stated. “It's somewhat difficult to acknowledge this reality … but post-COVID, the government appears to be pursuing the right thing in environmental protection and promoting EVs and tech investment,” Zhang said, while “the West, as represented by the United States, appear declining.”

The government's acquisition of shares in American firms has also drawn parallels with China, where the distinction between state and private industry is often blurred.

On Monday, authorities announced it will take a shareholder in a startup focused on mineral refinement, after taking similar stakes in additional firms deemed vital to the country's safety. These moves have made certain stakeholders concerned that the US is entering a new era of government meddling in the private sector.

There are still major differences between Trump’s America and the East. In October, multiple media outlets among others declined to agree to a Pentagon policy that required they only report on government-authorised information. US courts have halted or overturned numerous Trump’s actions, an action that would be impossible in the nation's party-dominated legal system.

An analyst, the founder of a consulting firm, a China-focused advisory firm, said: “America could descend into its gravest challenge of all time, far more severe than currently, and it will still be freer, more open, and liberal than China under Xi.”

Zhang observes that while many intellectuals in the country were shocked to see American colleges capitulate to official requests concerning DEI policies and open discourse on university grounds, in the East, the top universities are all state-owned inherently. University leaders, who are selected by the government, “cannot of saying no. They dare not defy orders.”

Nevertheless, people in the US are beginning to adopt measures previously confined to repressive regimes. One professor at an American college once vocal on bilateral matters declined to speak for this piece. He said: “Honestly, I fear of the censorship here: I genuinely feel more comfortable criticizing China's leader these days than say anything bad