When Vickie Wang, an emerging performer, steps onto the stage in New York, she's not just thinking about which jokes to tell. She also carefully considers which topics to steer clear of. “I refrain from directly criticizing the government,” she explained. Or if she does, she ensures it's not recorded for social media. “I would never publish openly content in which I openly disparage the government … I think this is a habit from China.”
Wang, 39, lived in Shanghai for nearly ten years, leaving in that year. By 2025, she moved to the US. When she got there, she dove into an intense period of “overindulging on freedom,” going to lectures, demonstrations, and delving into the city's public library.
However in the year after the president was elected again, there's been a “palpable change” in the environment, she says. “In China, I understood the boundaries, while in the US I'm standing on shifting sands.”
Wang’s concerns reflect a new climate in America which numerous individuals from China, or people with experience in the country, perceive as disturbingly familiar. Opponents face exclusion. The president demands total allegiance. Journalists face scrutiny. Institutions come under fire.
Trump has openly expressed about his admiration for China's leader, China’s authoritarian figure. He has described Xi as a “great guy”. As they agreed a brief ceasefire in economic tensions on Thursday, the camaraderie between both figures of countries with vastly different governance models was evident. Following years of optimism in the US that closer ties with the East could assist the rising power to liberalise, in the current administration, it appears as if America is being pulled in China's path, instead of vice versa.
“The United States is undergoing a period of cultural revolution,” said Zhang Qianfan, an academic at Peking University. “The president, Donald Trump, is trying to mobilise the grassroots in order to sideline or weaken the elite … similar to what happened in the country half a century ago.”
Since Trump unleashed the so-called Department for Government Efficiency, or the agency, on federal institutions at the start in office, many in China have viewed US politics via the perspective of China's historical period. Whether it is the mobilisation of the youth to execute the leader’s will, or purging institutions of perceived enemies, the president as viewed from China has brought Mao-style chaos to the US, though without equivalent degrees of violence.
However after the upheaval of the initial period under Trump has calmed, a new, different kind of climate has settled in the country, which in different ways seems familiar to numerous Chinese individuals.
‘The Lighthouse Is Less Bright’
The deepest parallel between the US today and China is the crackdown on open expression.
Deng Haiyan, now a Chinese Communist party dissenter, found himself in a controversy this year, similar to what he’d only previously experienced in China. Deng resided in America since 2019, having fled the country because of harassment from officials.
In September, following the passing of Charlie Kirk, Deng tweeted that the individual was a “scumbag”. Like people nationwide – many of whom lost their jobs as a result of expressing criticism about Kirk – he encountered a huge backlash. His family had personal info leaked and he was accused of being a Chinese spy attempting to create division.
“That event was a real shock. I never imagined that something like this could happen in America – something that should only happen in a repressive state,” Deng said.
Deng’s backlash came from online peers, rather than the government, but such of social surveillance bears parallels with the East.
“Regarding targeting dissenters and monitoring public speech on topics deemed controversial … It's appearing in the US,” noted an academic, an associate professor at a US university. “That’s something that you see in the East now as well,” she said, stating that concerns are rising in America of students reporting on educators, a form of surveillance promoted by Chinese authorities.
The professor, the legal expert, said that liberal Chinese intellectuals such as him once turned to America for political inspiration, in part because public debate on domestic politics in the country is dangerous. However, “The US isn't a ideal for progressive Chinese. The US's reputation has worsened across the board.”
“We used to see the US as the symbol of constitutional democracy, but after Trump took power, this lighthouse appears less luminous”.
Progressive Chinese, who are often, at least in private, skeptical about China’s political system, now perceive it less objectionable than America’s, Zhang said. “It's somewhat painful to accept this … but post-COVID, the government seems to be doing the right thing in improving the environment and promoting EVs and investing in hi-tech,” he noted, while “the West, as represented by America, appear declining.”
The Trump administration’s acquisition of shares in American firms has prompted comparisons with China, where the line between government and private industry is frequently unclear.
Recently, authorities stated it will take a shareholder in a startup focused on mineral refinement, following comparable shares in additional firms it considers vital to national security. These moves have made some investors nervous that the US is entering a fresh phase of state intervention in private industry.
There are still major differences between the US under Trump and the East. In October, 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 overturned many of presidential measures, something that would be impossible in the nation's CCP-controlled judiciary.
Isaac Stone Fish, the founder of Strategy Risks, specializing in China, commented: “America might face the worst crisis of all time, orders of magnitudes worse than currently, and it would remain freer, open, and liberal than the East under its leader.”
Zhang notes that while many intellectuals in China were shocked to see US universities yield to official requests concerning DEI policies and free speech on campus, in China, leading institutions are publicly controlled inherently. University leaders, who are selected by the state, “have no liberty refuse. They dare not defy orders.”
Nevertheless, people in the US are starting to adopt measures that were once associated with more authoritarian countries. An academic at a US university who was previously vocal on US-China issues refused to speak for this piece. He stated: “The truth is, I fear of suppression in the US: I genuinely feel less afraid criticizing China's leader these days than say anything bad
