As Vickie Wang, an emerging comedic talent, takes the stage in the Big Apple, she's not just thinking about what humor to deliver. Additionally, she weighs what subjects to avoid. “I refrain from directly criticizing the government,” she explained. And when she ventures there, she ensures it isn't captured for social media. “I would never publicly share material in which I directly criticize the government … I believe this is a learned behavior acquired back home.”
The comedian, thirty-nine, resided in the Chinese metropolis for nearly ten years, leaving in 2022. By 2025, she moved to the US. Upon arrival, she dove into a frenzy of “overindulging on freedom,” going to talks, protests, and exploring New York’s public library.
But over the past year since the president was elected again, there's been a noticeable shift in the atmosphere, she says. “Back home, I understood the boundaries, while in the US I find myself on shifting sands.”
Her concerns mirror an emerging climate in America which numerous individuals from China, or people who have lived in the country, perceive as disturbingly similar. Enemies face exclusion. The president demands absolute loyalty. Reporters are targeted. Institutions are attacked.
The president has openly expressed about his admiration for Xi Jinping, China’s authoritarian figure. He's called him as a “great guy”. When they reached a brief ceasefire in the trade war recently, the bonhomie between both figures of countries with diametrically opposed political systems became clear. And after decades of hope in America that closer ties with China may help the growing nation to liberalise, under Trump 2.0, it seems as if America is being pulled in China's path, instead of vice versa.
“The United States is undergoing an era of cultural revolution,” said a constitutional law expert, an academic at Peking University. “The top leader, Donald Trump, is attempting to mobilise the grassroots in order to marginalize or weaken established figures … reminiscent of what happened in the country half a century ago.”
Since the administration initiated what's termed a government streamlining body, or the agency, on federal institutions at the start of his term, many in China see US politics via the perspective of China's historical period. Be it the rallying of the youth to execute the leader’s will, or purging institutions of perceived enemies, Trump from a Chinese viewpoint has brought Mao-style chaos to the US, albeit without equivalent degrees of violence.
But after the upheaval of the early months under Trump subsided, an unfamiliar, different kind of climate has emerged in the US, which variously also feels recognizable to many Chinese people.
‘The Beacon Has Become Dimmer’
The most profound similarity between Trump’s America and China is the suppression on free speech.
A former police officer, now a Chinese Communist party critic, found himself in the eye of a storm recently, similar to what he’d only previously experienced in his homeland. Deng resided in America for several years, after escaping China due to harassment from officials.
In September, after the death of a public figure, Deng tweeted that the individual was a “scumbag”. Like people across the US – who were fired for expressing criticism about Kirk – he encountered a huge backlash. His family was doxed and he faced allegations of being a Chinese spy seeking to divide the US.
“That event was a real shock. I hadn't thought such a thing could happen in the United States – what typically happens in a repressive state,” he commented.
Deng’s pile on came from online peers, rather than the government, but such of public monitoring bears parallels with the East.
“Regarding targeting those who disagree and monitoring open discourse about issues that are sensitive … That’s starting to emerge here,” said an academic, an associate professor at Georgia State University. “This is observed in the East today as well,” she added, adding that there were now fears in America of pupils informing against teachers, a type of surveillance promoted by Chinese authorities.
Zhang, the legal expert, explained that progressive thinkers such as him used to look to the US for political inspiration, since public debate on internal affairs in China is dangerous. However, “America is no longer some kind of ideal for Chinese liberals. America’s image has declined generally.”
“We used to see the US as the symbol of democratic governance, but since the new administration, this lighthouse seems to have become less luminous”.
Chinese liberals, typically, behind closed doors, critical of the nation's governance, are increasingly finding it more acceptable than America’s, Zhang said. “It’s sort of painful to accept this reality … but after the pandemic, the government seems to be doing the right thing in environmental protection and promoting EVs and investing in hi-tech,” he noted, while “the West, exemplified by America, appear in decline.”
The government's acquisition of stakes in American firms has also drawn comparisons with China, where the line between government and business is often blurred.
On Monday, the US government stated it would become a shareholder in a startup focused on mineral refinement, following comparable shares in additional firms it considers essential for national security. The deals have made some investors nervous that the US is entering a new era of state intervention in private industry.
There are still significant distinctions between Trump’s America and the East. Last month, several news organisations among others refused to sign to a Pentagon policy that demanded they only report on approved news. US courts have halted or overturned numerous Trump’s actions, something that would be unthinkable in China’s CCP-controlled judiciary.
An analyst, who established of Strategy Risks, a China-focused advisory firm, said: “America might face the worst crisis of all time, orders of magnitudes worse than it is now, and it will still be more free, more open, and more liberal than China under Xi.”
Zhang notes that while numerous scholars in China were surprised to see US universities yield to official requests concerning diversity and inclusion practices and open discourse on university grounds, in China, leading institutions are publicly controlled by default. University leaders, who are appointed by the government, “cannot of saying no. They dare not defy orders.”
Still, Americans are beginning to take precautions that were once associated with more authoritarian countries. One professor at a US university once outspoken on bilateral matters refused to be interviewed for this piece. He said: “Honestly, I fear of suppression in the US: I actually feel less afraid criticizing China's leader now than say anything bad
