As Vickie Wang, an emerging performer, steps onto her platform in the Big Apple, she's not just considering which jokes to deliver. She also carefully considers what subjects to avoid. “I refrain from directly attacking the administration,” she explained. And when she does, she makes certain it's not recorded for social media. “I'd never publish openly material where I directly criticize the government … I think this is a learned behavior from China.”
Wang, 39, lived in the Chinese metropolis for almost ten years, leaving in 2022. By 2025, she relocated to America. When she got there, she embarked on a frenzy of “revenge bingeing on democracy,” going to talks, demonstrations, and delving into the city's library system.
But in the year since Donald Trump returned to office for the second time, there has been a noticeable shift in the environment, she says. “In China, I knew the boundaries, whereas here I'm standing on shifting sands.”
Wang’s concerns reflect an emerging political reality in the US which many Chinese, or people with experience in the country, perceive as eerily similar. Opponents face exclusion. The leader expects total allegiance. Journalists are targeted. Establishments are attacked.
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 temporary truce in economic tensions on Thursday, the camaraderie between the two leaders of nations with diametrically opposed governance models was evident. And after decades of hope in the US that improved relations with the East could assist the growing nation to liberalise, under Trump 2.0, it appears that the US is shifting in the Chinese direction, rather than the other way around.
“America is experiencing a period of cultural revolution,” stated a constitutional law expert, a professor at Peking University. “The top leader, Trump, is trying to rally the grassroots in order to sideline or weaken the elite … similar to what happened in the country half a century ago.”
Ever since the administration unleashed what's termed Department for Government Efficiency, or Doge, on federal institutions early on in office, many in China see American governance via the perspective of China's historical period. Be it the rallying of young people to execute the leader’s will, or purging organizations of those deemed opposition, Trump from a Chinese viewpoint has delivered disorder reminiscent of Mao to the US, albeit without equivalent degrees of violence.
However since the upheaval of the initial period under Trump subsided, an unfamiliar, different kind of climate has emerged in the US, which in different ways also feels familiar to numerous Chinese individuals.
‘The Lighthouse Is Dimmer’
The deepest similarity between Trump’s America and China is the crackdown on free speech.
Deng Haiyan, turned Chinese Communist party critic, found himself in a controversy recently, similar to what he’d only previously experienced in China. Deng resided in the US for several years, having fled China because of pressure from the authorities.
In September, after the death of Charlie Kirk, Deng tweeted that the individual was a “scumbag”. Like people nationwide – who lost their jobs for expressing criticism about Kirk – he encountered significant backlash. His family was doxed and he was accused of being a Chinese spy seeking to divide the US.
“This incident was a real shock. I never imagined that something like this would occur in America – something that typically happens in an authoritarian country,” he commented.
Deng’s pile on came from fellow social media users, rather than the government, but that kind of public monitoring bears similarities with the East.
“Regarding going after dissenters and monitoring open discourse about issues deemed controversial … That’s starting to emerge in the US,” said Maria Repnikova, an associate professor at a US university. “This is that you see in China today as too,” she added, stating that concerns are rising in America of pupils informing against teachers, a type of monitoring promoted by the CCP.
The professor, the Peking University law professor, explained that progressive thinkers like himself used to look to America for ideals, since openly discussing domestic politics in China is risky. However, “The US isn't some kind of god for progressive Chinese. America’s image has declined across the board.”
“We used to see the US as the beacon of constitutional democracy, but since the new administration, that guide appears dimmer”.
Progressive Chinese, who are often, at least in private, critical of China’s political system, are increasingly finding it less objectionable than America’s, he stated. “It’s sort of painful to accept this reality … but after the pandemic, authorities appears to be pursuing the right thing in improving the environment and promoting EVs and investing in hi-tech,” Zhang said, while “Western nations, as represented by the United States, seems to be in decline.”
The government's purchase of stakes in American firms has prompted comparisons with the East, where the line between state and private industry is frequently unclear.
Recently, the US government stated it will take an investor in a startup specialising in mineral refinement, after taking similar stakes in other companies deemed essential for national security. The deals have left some investors concerned that America is entering a fresh phase of state intervention in private industry.
There are still significant distinctions between Trump’s America and China. Last month, multiple media outlets among others refused to sign to a Pentagon policy that required they only report on approved information. US courts have halted or overturned many of presidential measures, something that is unthinkable in the nation's party-dominated legal system.
Isaac Stone Fish, who established of Strategy Risks, a China-focused advisory firm, commented: “America could descend into its gravest challenge of all time, orders of magnitudes worse than currently, and it will still be more free, open, and liberal than the East under its leader.”
The professor notes that although many intellectuals in China were surprised to see US universities capitulate to official requests concerning diversity and inclusion practices and open discourse on campus, in China, the top universities are all state-owned by default. University leaders, which are selected by the government, “have no liberty refuse. They can’t afford defy orders.”
Nevertheless, people in the US are beginning to adopt measures previously associated with repressive regimes. One professor at a US university once vocal on US-China issues declined to be interviewed for this piece. He said: “The truth is, I am scared of the censorship here: I actually feel more comfortable criticizing China's leader these days than say anything bad
