Many people have tried defining Donald Trump, our president once again, as an autocrat or a king wannabe. I say he is also like Mao Zedong, founder of the People’s Republic of China, who plunged the country into 10 years of violent and disastrous Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution.
Mao launched the Cultural Revolution because he believed capitalists and reactionaries hidden within the Communist Party wanted to move China away from socialism. He started by targeting arts and literature that he deemed critical of the Communist Party. Soon, of course, the movement consumed everything and everybody in China.
Trump and Mao are similar, although opposite, as Mao wanted China to be firmly socialist, whereas Trump wants to “Make America Great Again.” If Trump brings chaos, as Nikki Haley said, Mao liked the Chinese saying, “Great disorder under the heavens leads to great order.”
Mao had contempt for experts or specialists, seeing them as not red or revolutionary enough, if not counter-revolutionary. For instance, Mao named a village leader and a textile worker as vice premiers because they were Mao loyalists as well as exemplary workers.
Similarly, Trump named a news anchor and former infantry officer his secretary of defense; a vaccine skeptic and former environmental lawyer his secretary of health; and a podcaster and former cop his deputy director of the FBI – not because of their expertise or experience, but because of their loyalty.
Mao told his people that one had to smash everything to build anything new. He dismantled every level of China’s government, removing governors and mayors labeled “capitalist roaders,” and installed revolutionary committees composed of workers, peasants, soldiers, women and ethnic minorities.
Trump has vowed from his first term to “drain the swamp” and now is doing it by firing military generals, inspector generals and thousands of staff from 17 federal agencies, and working to shut down the Department of Education, Agency for International Development, and Federal Emergency Management Agency.
Chairman Mao attacked not only capitalists but also Chinese traditions, as he called on his people to get rid of old culture, old thoughts, old habits, and old customs (including traditional holidays, worships, superstition, operas, etc.) and establish new and revolutionary culture, from textbooks to ballets.
Trump is trying to rid America of liberal culture, including policies and practices of DEI, critical race theory, gender ideology, globalism, etc., and replace them with “common sense,” “merit” and “America First.”
Mao notoriously used as his shock brigades the Red Guards, composed mostly of high school and college students, to take power from local governments and rough up people considered counterrevolutionaries.
Now Trump is also happily using and praising the very smart twenty-somethings of DOGE, headed by his chainsaw-brandishing special employee Elon Musk, as they go around firing people, cutting programs, and upending lives across the country.
Mao became a cult if not a god, omnipresent and omnipotent. Officials had to start speeches by quoting Mao. Everybody had to wear a Mao button and carry with them a copy of the Little Red Book of Mao quotes. No one dared to disobey.
Now, Trump also enjoys a cult-like following, fed by his two election wins and two assassination attempts. His Republican supporters, especially his cabinet members, often start interviews with “under President Trump’s great leadership,” “only with President Trump,” and so on. JD Vance even helped derail the Trump-Zelenskyy meeting by criticizing the Ukrainian president for not thanking President Trump. If Republicans disagree with Trump, they stay quiet out of fear of retribution.
The greatest shock Mao gave China and the world was inviting President Nixon to Beijing, a move described as ice-breaking and earth-shattering. The Chinese people couldn’t believe their eyes: their most-loved or feared Communist Party leader and helmsman shaking hands with the most-hated imperialist, America’s biggest anti-Communist red-baiter!
Trump shocked the world by talking peace with Putin, America’s and NATO’s greatest adversary, while pressuring Ukraine, the victim of Russian aggression, to enter a mineral business deal to repay U.S. aid.
So, was Mao betraying China’s socialist revolution by normalizing diplomatic relations with the United States? Is Trump betraying American and Western democracy and Ukraine by siding with Putin? Or, as some speculate, is Trump doing a reverse Nixon, aligning with Russia against China instead of aligning with China against the Soviets?
Stay tuned.
Thank you! I’ve been seeing this analogy since this administration started its destructive governance pattern: A very small cadre at the top engages a smallish number of committed followers to wreck the government and instill fear in the population, to increase the cadre’s power over both with hard-to-predict policies and a cult of personality. Key differences, I think, are that Mao’s policies, however misguided, were based on serious long-term strategic thinking rather than short-term advantages and simple reactions, and Mao’s cult of personality was much more deeply rooted. . . . what a comparison to have to make!