When Vickie Wang, a rising performer, steps onto the stage in the Big Apple, she's not just thinking about which jokes to deliver. Additionally, she carefully considers which topics to avoid. “I refrain from directly criticizing the government,” she explained. And when she does, she makes certain it's not captured for social media. “I would never publish openly material where I openly disparage authorities … I think this is a learned behavior acquired back home.”
The comedian, 39, resided in the Chinese metropolis for almost a decade, departing in 2022. By 2025, she moved to the US. Upon arrival, she embarked on an intense period of “revenge bingeing on freedom,” going to talks, demonstrations, and delving into the city's library system.
But over the past year after the president was elected for the second time, there's been a “palpable change” in the atmosphere, she says. “In China, I knew the boundaries, while here I'm standing on shifting sands.”
Wang’s concerns mirror an emerging climate in America which many Chinese, or those with experience in the country, find eerily familiar. Enemies face exclusion. The president demands total allegiance. Journalists are targeted. Institutions are attacked.
The president has openly expressed regarding his respect for Xi Jinping, China’s authoritarian figure. He has described him as a “great guy”. As they agreed a brief ceasefire in economic tensions recently, the bonhomie between both figures of countries with diametrically opposed governance models was evident. And after decades of hope in America that improved relations with the East could assist the rising power become more open, under Trump 2.0, it seems as if America is being pulled in the Chinese direction, rather than the other way around.
“America is undergoing a period of societal upheaval,” said a constitutional law expert, a professor at a top Chinese university. “The president, Trump, is trying to rally the grassroots to marginalize or undermine the elite … similar to events in China decades past.”
Ever since the administration initiated what's termed Department for Government Efficiency, or Doge, on federal institutions at the start in office, numerous Chinese observers have viewed American governance through the lens of the Cultural Revolution. Whether it is the rallying of the youth to carry out presidential directives, or purging institutions of perceived enemies, the president as viewed from China has brought Mao-style chaos to America, though absent equivalent degrees of force.
But since the upheaval of the initial period of the new administration subsided, a new, different kind of climate has settled in the US, which variously seems recognizable to numerous Chinese individuals.
‘The Lighthouse Has Become Less Bright’
The most profound parallel between Trump’s America and China is the suppression on free speech.
Deng Haiyan, turned Chinese Communist party critic, found himself in the eye of a storm this year, similar to what he once faced in his homeland. Deng resided in America for several years, after escaping the country due to harassment from officials.
In September, following the passing 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 a huge backlash. Relatives was doxed and he was accused of being a Chinese spy seeking to create division.
“That event was a real shock. I never imagined that something like this could happen in America – what should only happen in a repressive state,” Deng said.
Deng’s backlash came from fellow social media users, rather than the state, but such of social surveillance bears parallels with the East.
“In terms of targeting those who disagree and monitoring open discourse on topics that are sensitive … That’s starting to emerge in the US,” said an academic, a scholar at Georgia State University. “That’s something observed in the East today as too,” she said, stating that there were now fears in America of pupils informing against educators, a form of surveillance promoted by Chinese authorities.
The professor, the Peking University law professor, explained that liberal Chinese intellectuals like himself once turned to the US for ideals, in part because public debate on domestic politics in China is dangerous. However, “The US isn't some kind of god for progressive Chinese. The US's reputation has declined across the board.”
“We used to see the US as the symbol of democratic governance, but after Trump took power, this lighthouse seems to have become less luminous”.
Chinese liberals, typically, behind closed doors, skeptical about China’s political system, now perceive it less objectionable than America’s, Zhang said. “It’s sort of difficult to acknowledge this … but after the pandemic, the government appears to be pursuing the right thing in improving the environment and developing electric cars and investing in hi-tech,” he noted, while “the West, as represented by America, appear in decline.”
The Trump administration’s acquisition of stakes in US companies has also drawn parallels with China, where the distinction between state and private industry is often blurred.
Recently, authorities announced it would become a shareholder in a startup specialising in rare earth processing, following similar stakes in other companies deemed essential for national security. The deals have left some investors concerned that the US is embarking on a new era of state intervention in private industry.
Yet, there remain major differences between Trump’s America and the East. Last month, multiple media outlets including the Guardian declined to agree to a defense department rule that required they only report on approved news. American judiciary have blocked or reversed numerous Trump’s actions, an action that would be impossible in the nation's party-dominated legal system.
An analyst, the founder of a consulting firm, a China-focused advisory firm, said: “The United States might face its gravest challenge of all time, far more severe than currently, and it would remain more free, open, and liberal than the East under its leader.”
Zhang notes that while many intellectuals in the country were surprised to see American colleges capitulate to government demands regarding DEI policies and free speech on university grounds, in the East, leading institutions are publicly controlled by default. University leaders, who are appointed by the state, “have no liberty refuse. They can’t afford defy orders.”
Nevertheless, Americans are beginning to adopt measures previously confined to more authoritarian countries. An academic at an American college once outspoken on bilateral matters refused to be interviewed for this article. He said: “The truth is, I fear of suppression in the US: I genuinely feel less afraid to criticise Xi now than say anything bad
