Actually China is far further along in "turning autonomous weaponry against one's citizens" than the US is. Ubiquitous surveillance and "social credit score" have been expanding in China since the early 2000s.

In fact one might say that what the communist parties did in the 1910s was pretty much that. Ubiquitous surveillance is the problem here, not AI. Communist states used tens of thousands of "agents" that would just walk around, listen in to random conversations, and arrest (and later torture and deport) people. Of course communist states that still exist, like China, have started using AI to do this, but it is nothing new for China and it's people.

And, of course, what these communist states are doing is protecting the rich and powerful in society, and enforcing their "vision", using far more oppressive means than even the GOP dares to dream about. Including against "socialist causes", like LGBTQ. For starters, using state violence against people for merely talking about problems, for example.