Trump's United States Under Trump's Second Term Feels Strangely Familiar to Observers from China
When Vickie Wang, an emerging comedic talent, takes the stage in the Big Apple, she is not only considering which jokes to tell. She also weighs which topics to steer clear of. “I don't engage in directly attacking the administration,” she stated. Or if she does, she makes certain it isn't recorded for social media. “I'd never publicly share content where I openly disparage the government … I believe this is a learned behavior from China.”
Wang, thirty-nine, resided in Shanghai for nearly ten years, departing in that year. By 2025, she relocated to America. Upon arrival, she dove into a frenzy of “revenge bingeing on democracy,” attending talks, protests, and exploring the city's public library.
But over the past year after the president was elected for the second time, there's been a noticeable shift in the environment, she notes. “Back home, I understood the boundaries, whereas here I find myself on shifting sands.”
Her concerns reflect an emerging climate in America which many Chinese, or people who have lived in China, perceive as eerily similar. Opponents face exclusion. The leader expects total allegiance. Reporters are targeted. Establishments are attacked.
Trump has openly expressed regarding his respect for Xi Jinping, the nation's strongman leader. He has described Xi as “fantastic”. When they reached a temporary truce in economic tensions on Thursday, the bonhomie between both figures of countries with diametrically opposed governance models was evident. Following years of optimism in the US that closer ties with China may help the growing nation to liberalise, under Trump 2.0, it seems as if America is being pulled in China's path, instead of the other way around.
“America is undergoing a period of cultural revolution,” said a constitutional law expert, an academic at a top Chinese university. “The president, Trump, is trying to mobilise the grassroots in order to marginalize or undermine the elite … reminiscent of events in the country half a century ago.”
Ever since Trump initiated what's termed Department for Government Efficiency, or the agency, on the Washington bureaucracy at the start of his term, many in China see American governance through the lens of China's historical period. Whether it is the rallying of the youth to execute the leader’s will, or cleansing institutions of those deemed opposition, the president as viewed from China has brought Mao-style chaos to America, albeit absent equivalent degrees of violence.
However since the upheaval of the initial period under Trump subsided, an unfamiliar, different kind of political atmosphere has emerged in the US, which variously seems familiar to numerous Chinese individuals.
‘The Beacon Is Less Bright’
The deepest parallel between the US today and the East is the crackdown on open expression.
A former police officer, turned CCP critic, found himself in the eye of a storm recently, similar to what he’d only previously experienced in China. Deng has lived in America for several years, having fled China due to harassment from the authorities.
In September, following the passing of Charlie Kirk, he posted that Kirk was “despicable”. Similar to others across the US – who lost their jobs as a result of making negative comments about Kirk – he encountered significant backlash. His family was doxed and he was accused of espionage seeking to create division.
“That event surprised me deeply. I hadn't thought such a thing would occur in the United States – what typically happens in a repressive state,” Deng said.
Deng’s backlash came from online peers, instead of the state, but that kind of social surveillance bears parallels with China.
“In terms of targeting dissenters and monitoring public speech on topics that are sensitive … That’s starting to emerge here,” noted an academic, an associate professor at a US university. “This is observed in China today as well,” she added, stating that there were now fears in America of students reporting on teachers, a type of monitoring that has been encouraged by Chinese authorities.
Zhang, the Peking University law professor, said that liberal Chinese intellectuals such as him once turned to America for political inspiration, since public debate on internal affairs in the country is risky. However, “The US isn't some kind of god for progressive Chinese. America’s image has worsened across the board.”
“We used to see America as the symbol of democratic governance, but after Trump took power, that guide seems to have become less luminous”.
Progressive Chinese, who are often, at least in private, critical of the nation's governance, 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 correct policies in improving the environment and promoting EVs and tech investment,” he noted, while “Western nations, as represented by America, seems to be in decline.”
The Trump administration’s purchase of shares in American firms has prompted parallels with China, where the line between state and private industry is often blurred.
Recently, authorities stated it would become a shareholder in a new company specialising in rare earth processing, following similar stakes in other companies deemed essential for national security. The deals have made certain stakeholders concerned that America is embarking on a new era of state intervention in private industry.
Yet, there remain major differences between Trump’s America and China. Last month, several news organisations among others refused to sign to a defense department rule that demanded reporting solely on government-authorised news. American judiciary have halted or overturned numerous presidential measures, an action that is impossible in the nation's party-dominated legal system.
Isaac Stone Fish, who established of Strategy Risks, specializing in China, commented: “The United States could descend into its gravest challenge of all time, far more severe than it is now, and it will still be freer, more open, and liberal than China under Xi.”
Zhang notes that while many intellectuals in China were shocked to see US universities yield to government demands regarding diversity and inclusion practices and open discourse on campus, in the East, leading institutions are publicly controlled by default. Administrators, which are appointed by the state, “cannot of saying no. They dare not to be disobedient.”
Nevertheless, people in the US are beginning to adopt measures that were once associated with repressive regimes. An academic at an American college once outspoken on US-China issues refused to be interviewed for this piece. He said: “The truth is, I fear of suppression in the US: I genuinely feel more comfortable criticizing China's leader now than say anything bad