The America Under Trump's Second Term Feels Strangely Recognizable to Observers from China

When Vickie Wang, a rising comedic talent, takes the stage in the Big Apple, she is not only thinking about which jokes to deliver. Additionally, she weighs what subjects to avoid. “I refrain from openly criticizing the administration,” she explained. And when she ventures there, she makes certain it isn't captured for online platforms. “I'd never publicly share material in which I openly disparage the government … I think this is a learned behavior from China.”

Wang, 39, resided in the Chinese metropolis for nearly ten years, departing in 2022. In 2025, she relocated to the US. When she got there, she embarked on a frenzy of “revenge bingeing on democracy,” going to lectures, protests, and exploring the city's public library.

But over the past year since Donald Trump returned to office again, there has been a noticeable shift in the environment, she says. “In China, I understood where the line was, whereas in the US I'm standing on unstable ground.”

Wang’s fears reflect an emerging climate in the US which many Chinese, or people who have lived in the country, perceive as eerily familiar. Opponents face exclusion. The leader expects absolute loyalty. Reporters are targeted. Establishments are attacked.

Trump has openly expressed regarding his respect for Xi Jinping, the nation's strongman leader. He's called him as “fantastic”. When they reached a brief ceasefire in economic tensions on Thursday, the bonhomie between both figures of countries with diametrically opposed governance models was evident. Following years of hope in the US that improved relations with China could assist the rising power become more open, under Trump 2.0, it appears as if the US is shifting in the Chinese direction, rather than vice versa.

“The United States is experiencing a period of societal upheaval,” stated Zhang Qianfan, a professor at Peking University. “The president, Donald Trump, is attempting to rally the masses to marginalize or weaken established figures … similar to events in China half a century ago.”

Ever since Trump initiated the so-called a government streamlining body, or the agency, on federal institutions early on of his term, numerous Chinese observers see American governance through the lens of China's historical period. Be it the rallying of young people to carry out the leader’s will, or cleansing organizations of those deemed opposition, the president as viewed from China has delivered disorder reminiscent of Mao to the US, albeit without the same levels of force.

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

‘The Beacon Has Become Dimmer’

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

A former police officer, turned CCP dissenter, ended up in a controversy recently, the likes of which he’d only previously experienced in his homeland. Deng has lived in America since 2019, after escaping China due to pressure from the authorities.

Last fall, after the death of Charlie Kirk, he posted that the individual was a “scumbag”. Similar to others nationwide – who were fired for making negative comments regarding him – Deng faced a huge backlash. His family was doxed and he was accused of being a Chinese spy seeking to divide the US.

“That event surprised me deeply. I never imagined such a thing could happen in the United States – what should only happen in an authoritarian country,” Deng said.

His backlash came from fellow social media users, rather than the government, but such of social surveillance bears parallels with China.

“In terms of going after those who disagree and monitoring open discourse about issues that are sensitive … It's appearing here,” said an academic, a scholar at Georgia State University. “This is that you see in China now as too,” she said, stating that concerns are rising in the US of pupils informing against teachers, a type of surveillance that has been encouraged by the CCP.

Zhang, the legal expert, said that liberal Chinese intellectuals such as him once turned to America for political inspiration, in part because public debate on domestic politics in the country is dangerous. But now, “The US isn't some kind of god for progressive Chinese. The US's reputation has declined generally.”

“We used to see America as the beacon of constitutional democracy, but after Trump took power, that guide seems to have become less luminous”.

Chinese liberals, who are often, at least in private, critical of the nation's governance, are increasingly finding it less objectionable than America’s, Zhang said. “It’s sort of difficult to acknowledge this … but after the pandemic, the government appears to be pursuing the right thing in improving the environment and developing electric cars and investing in hi-tech,” he noted, while “the West, as represented by America, appear in decline.”

The government's purchase of stakes in US companies has also drawn comparisons with the East, where the distinction between government and private industry is often blurred.

Recently, authorities stated it would become an investor in a new company specialising in rare earth processing, following similar stakes in other companies it considers vital to the country's safety. These moves have left certain stakeholders concerned that the US is entering a fresh phase of state intervention in private industry.

There are still significant distinctions between Trump’s America and the East. In October, multiple media outlets including the Guardian declined to agree to a Pentagon policy that required reporting solely on government-authorised news. US courts have halted or overturned many of presidential measures, something that is unthinkable in China’s CCP-controlled judiciary.

Isaac Stone Fish, the founder of a consulting firm, a China-focused advisory firm, commented: “America might face the worst crisis of all time, far more severe than it is now, and it will still be more free, more open, and liberal than the East under its leader.”

The professor observes that while many intellectuals in the country were surprised to see US universities yield to official requests regarding DEI policies and open discourse on campus, in the East, leading institutions are publicly controlled inherently. Administrators, which are selected by the government, “have no liberty refuse. They can’t afford defy orders.”

Still, people in the US are starting to take precautions that were once confined to more authoritarian countries. An academic at an American college once outspoken on US-China issues refused to be interviewed for this article. He stated: “The truth is, I fear of suppression here: I genuinely feel less afraid to criticise Xi these days than say anything bad