Trump's United States During Trump's Second Term Feels Oddly Recognizable to Observers from the East

When Vickie Wang, an emerging performer, takes her platform in the Big Apple, she's not only thinking about which jokes to deliver. Additionally, she weighs which topics to avoid. “I refrain from openly criticizing the government,” she stated. And when she does, she makes certain it's not captured for social media. “I'd never publish openly content in which I directly criticize authorities … I believe this is a habit from China.”

Wang, 39, lived in Shanghai for almost ten years, leaving in 2022. By 2025, she relocated to the US. Upon arrival, she dove into a frenzy of “revenge bingeing on democracy,” going to talks, demonstrations, and delving into New York’s public library.

However in the year since the president was elected again, there's been a noticeable shift in the atmosphere, she notes. “Back home, I understood the boundaries, whereas in the US I'm standing on unstable ground.”

Her concerns reflect a new political reality in America which many Chinese, or people with experience in China, find eerily similar. Enemies are ostracised. The leader expects total allegiance. Reporters face scrutiny. Institutions come under fire.

The president has openly expressed about his admiration for China's leader, the nation's strongman leader. He's called Xi as “fantastic”. When they reached a brief ceasefire in economic tensions recently, the bonhomie between the two leaders of countries with diametrically opposed governance models was evident. And after decades of hope in America that improved relations with the East may help the rising power become more open, in the current administration, it appears that the US is being pulled in the Chinese direction, rather than the other way around.

“The United States is experiencing a period of cultural revolution,” said a constitutional law expert, a professor at a top Chinese university. “The top leader, Trump, is trying to mobilise the grassroots to marginalize or weaken the elite … similar to what happened in the country half a century ago.”

Ever since Trump initiated the so-called Department for Government Efficiency, or the agency, on the Washington bureaucracy at the start of his term, numerous Chinese observers have viewed US politics via the perspective of the Cultural Revolution. Be it the mobilisation of the youth to execute presidential directives, or cleansing institutions of those deemed opposition, the president as viewed from China has delivered disorder reminiscent of Mao to the US, though absent equivalent degrees of violence.

But after the turmoil of the initial period under Trump subsided, a new, distinct type of climate has emerged in the country, which variously seems recognizable to many Chinese people.

‘The Lighthouse Is Dimmer’

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

Deng Haiyan, turned CCP dissenter, found himself in the eye of a storm this year, the likes of which he once faced in China. He resided in the US since 2019, having fled China because of pressure from the authorities.

In September, following the passing of Charlie Kirk, Deng tweeted that the individual was “despicable”. Similar to others across the US – who lost their jobs as a result of expressing criticism regarding him – Deng faced significant backlash. His family was doxed and he was accused of being a Chinese spy seeking to create division.

“That event was a real shock. I hadn't thought that something like this would occur in America – something that should only happen in a repressive state,” he commented.

Deng’s backlash originated from online peers, rather than the state, but such of social surveillance bears similarities with China.

“Regarding targeting dissenters and monitoring public speech about issues deemed controversial … It's appearing in the US,” noted Maria Repnikova, a scholar at a US university. “That’s something that you see in the East now as too,” she said, adding that concerns are rising 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 progressive thinkers like himself used to look to the US for political inspiration, since public debate on domestic politics in the country is dangerous. But now, “America is no longer some kind of ideal for progressive Chinese. America’s image has worsened across the board.”

“We used to see America as the beacon of democratic governance, but since the new administration, this lighthouse seems to have become less luminous”.

Chinese liberals, typically, behind closed doors, critical of China’s political system, are increasingly finding it less objectionable than America’s, Zhang said. “It's somewhat painful to accept this reality … but post-COVID, authorities appears to be pursuing the right thing in environmental protection and promoting EVs and investing in hi-tech,” Zhang said, while “Western nations, as represented by the United States, seems to be declining.”

The government's acquisition of shares in US companies has also drawn parallels with the East, where the line between government and business is often blurred.

Recently, the US government announced it would become an investor in a new company specialising in mineral refinement, after taking similar stakes in additional firms it considers vital to the country's safety. These moves have made certain stakeholders concerned that America is entering a fresh phase of government meddling in the private sector.

There are still major differences between Trump’s America and the East. Last month, multiple media outlets among others declined to agree to a Pentagon policy that required they only report on approved information. US courts have blocked or overturned numerous Trump’s actions, something that is unthinkable in China’s party-dominated legal system.

Isaac Stone Fish, the founder of a consulting firm, a China-focused advisory firm, said: “The United States might face the worst crisis of all time, orders of magnitudes worse than it is now, and it will still be freer, open, and liberal than China under Xi.”

The professor notes that while many intellectuals in China were shocked to see American colleges yield to government demands regarding diversity and inclusion practices and open discourse on university grounds, in the East, the top universities are publicly controlled inherently. University leaders, who are selected by the state, “cannot of saying no. They can’t afford to be disobedient.”

Nevertheless, Americans are beginning to take precautions previously confined to more authoritarian countries. An academic at a US university who was previously outspoken on US-China issues refused to speak for this piece. He said: “Honestly, I fear of suppression in the US: I actually feel less afraid criticizing China's leader these days than say anything bad