MAGA Mao: How Trump’s 2025 Crackdowns Echo China’s Dark Past

The Cultural Revolution—a ten-year joyride through ideological fanaticism, political purges, and the kind of paranoia that makes tinfoil hats look like a reasonable fashion choice. In 1966, Chairman Mao, feeling a little insecure about his grip on power (because nothing says “strong leadership” like fearing a poet with bad knees), decided China needed a full-blown societal upheaval. His solution? Encourage millions of teenagers—history’s most volatile, hormonal demographic—to form the Red Guards and go after teachers, intellectuals, and anyone who wasn’t Mao’s biggest fan. The result? Mass humiliation, public beatings, book burnings, and a national mood somewhere between “revolutionary fervor” and “unhinged cult cosplay.”

Mao, like all great insecure autocrats, didn’t just silence his enemies—he erased them. Professors, artists, bureaucrats, even high-ranking Communist Party officials found themselves labeled “counter-revolutionaries” and sent to “re-education camps” (which, spoiler alert, were just labor camps with a fancier name). Meanwhile, Mao’s face was slapped on posters, his words printed in a tiny red book that every good citizen had to carry, and the country got a one-size-fits-all ideology: whatever Mao said was good, and everything else was a crime. It was a masterclass in thought control, proving that when reality doesn’t match your vision, you can always just force everyone to pretend it does.

Fast forward to 2025, and here comes Donald J. Trump—self-proclaimed enemy of communism, yet, weirdly, taking a few notes from Mao’s little red playbook.

For a guy that supposedly hates communism, Trump sure is getting cozy with its greatest hits: political purges, ideological crackdowns, and an overwhelming desire to make sure only his version of reality exists. Let’s start with his latest masterpiece—Executive Order 14151, the “Ending Radical And Wasteful Government DEI Programs And Preferencing” order. It doesn’t roll off the tongue like “Great Leap Forward,” but the results are eerily similar. Overnight, federal agencies were ordered to dismantle all diversity, equity, and inclusion programs. Employees involved in such initiatives were put on notice—turn in your woke lanyard and pack your things. A national list of suspected “DEI enforcers” was compiled, because nothing screams “small government conservatism” like a taxpayer-funded blacklist.

But don’t worry—this administration is also making sure the next generation of revolutionaries, I mean, patriots, stays in line. Protesting the wrong thing? You might find yourself on the first flight out. Trump’s new immigration crackdown includes a fun little provision where international students caught at pro-Palestinian protests get their visas revoked. You can still chant “Let’s go Brandon” all you want, but say something really dangerous—like suggesting human rights apply universally—and suddenly, you’re a national security threat.

Then there’s the latest decree: the official government recognition of only two genders. Never mind that this isn’t how biology, medicine, or reality works—the important thing is that it feels right to the administration. Much like Mao’s mission to destroy the “Four Olds”—old customs, culture, habits, and ideas—Trump’s war on DEI, gender recognition, and corporate diversity policies is all about scrubbing away what he considers ideological contamination. Reality doesn’t matter; all that matters is enforcing the right beliefs, and if those beliefs require a few career casualties and a whole lot of performative outrage? Even better.

And let’s not forget the Department of Justice’s new hobby: investigating corporations that have DEI policies. Attorney General Pam Bondi has taken it upon herself to make sure businesses aren’t engaging in the heinous crime of… voluntarily choosing who they hire and promote. Because nothing says “free market capitalism” like the government stepping in to punish private companies for not toeing the ideological line.

So, here we are, watching history rinse and repeat. Mao had his Red Guards; Trump has his online army of self-righteous keyboard warriors, always ready to “expose” liberal professors or accuse corporations of “woke tyranny.” Mao had his thought police; Trump has his legislative wrecking crew, making sure the country reflects only his vision of reality.

The irony, of course, is that while Trump and his supporters froth at the mouth about the dangers of communism, they’re busy running the same authoritarian playbook—just with more fast-food photo ops and fewer little red books. Instead of “Mao Zedong Thought,” we’ve got Trump’s Truth Social rants, which serve the same function: a required loyalty test where disagreeing with the leader gets you exiled—whether from your job, your party, or the country itself.

The more things change, the more they stay the same. And if history teaches us anything, it’s that once a leader starts trying to police reality itself, things usually don’t end well. But hey—at least there’s still time to order your mandatory “Dear Leader” merchandise.