As Vickie Wang, an emerging performer, takes the stage in the Big Apple, she is not just considering which jokes to tell. Additionally, she carefully considers which topics to avoid. “I don't engage in openly attacking the administration,” she stated. Or if she ventures there, she ensures it isn't recorded for online platforms. “I'd never publish openly material where I openly disparage authorities … I believe it's a habit from China.”
The comedian, 39, lived in the Chinese metropolis for nearly ten years, leaving in that year. In 2025, she relocated to America. Upon arrival, she dove into an intense period of “revenge bingeing on democracy,” going to lectures, demonstrations, and exploring the city's public library.
But over the past year after the president was elected for the second time, there's been a noticeable shift in the atmosphere, she notes. “Back home, I knew the boundaries, while in the US I'm standing on unstable ground.”
Wang’s fears mirror a new political reality in America which numerous individuals from China, or people with experience in the country, perceive as disturbingly similar. Opponents face exclusion. The president expects absolute loyalty. Reporters face scrutiny. Institutions are attacked.
The president has openly expressed regarding his respect for Xi Jinping, China’s strongman leader. He has described him as a “great guy”. When they reached a temporary truce in economic tensions recently, the bonhomie between both figures of nations with diametrically opposed governance models became clear. Following years of hope in America that improved relations with China may help the rising power to liberalise, under Trump 2.0, it seems as if the US is being pulled in the Chinese direction, rather than vice versa.
“The United States is experiencing an era of cultural revolution,” stated a constitutional law expert, an academic at Peking University. “The top leader, Donald Trump, is trying to rally the grassroots to sideline or weaken the elite … reminiscent of what happened in China decades past.”
Since the administration initiated what's termed Department for Government Efficiency, or the agency, on the Washington bureaucracy at the start of his term, many in China have viewed American governance via the perspective of China's historical period. Be it the mobilisation of the youth to carry out the leader’s will, or cleansing institutions of perceived enemies, Trump as viewed from China has brought disorder reminiscent of Mao to America, though absent equivalent degrees of force.
But since the turmoil of the initial period under Trump subsided, an unfamiliar, different kind of climate has emerged in the country, which variously seems recognizable to numerous Chinese individuals.
‘The Beacon Has Become Less Bright’
The deepest similarity between Trump’s America and the East is the crackdown on free speech.
Deng Haiyan, turned CCP dissenter, ended up in a controversy this year, similar to what he once faced in his homeland. He resided in America since 2019, having fled the country because of harassment from officials.
Last fall, after the death of a public figure, he posted that the individual was “despicable”. Similar to others nationwide – many of whom were fired for making negative comments about Kirk – he encountered a huge backlash. His family was doxed and he was accused of espionage attempting to divide the US.
“That event surprised me deeply. I never imagined that something like this could happen in America – what typically happens in an authoritarian country,” he commented.
Deng’s backlash originated from fellow social media users, instead of the state, but that kind of social surveillance bears parallels with the East.
“In terms of targeting those who disagree and monitoring public speech about issues deemed controversial … That’s starting to emerge in the US,” said an academic, a scholar at Georgia State University. “This is 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 that has been encouraged by the CCP.
The professor, the legal expert, said that liberal Chinese intellectuals like himself used to look to the US for ideals, in part because public debate on internal affairs in China is risky. But now, “The US isn't a ideal for Chinese liberals. America’s image has worsened generally.”
“We once viewed the US as the beacon of democratic governance, but since the new administration, that guide seems to have become dimmer”.
Progressive Chinese, who are often, at least in private, skeptical about the nation's governance, are increasingly finding it more acceptable 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 tech investment,” Zhang said, while “the West, exemplified by America, seems to be in decline.”
The Trump administration’s purchase of stakes in American firms has also drawn parallels with the East, where the line between state and private industry is often blurred.
On Monday, the US government announced it would become a shareholder in a startup focused on mineral refinement, following comparable shares in other companies deemed essential for the country's safety. These moves have made some investors concerned that America is entering a new era of government meddling in private industry.
Yet, there remain major differences between the US under Trump and the East. In October, several news organisations among others refused to sign to a Pentagon policy that required they only report on government-authorised information. American judiciary have blocked or overturned many of Trump’s actions, an action that is unthinkable in China’s CCP-controlled judiciary.
Isaac Stone Fish, the founder of Strategy Risks, a China-focused advisory firm, said: “America might face its gravest challenge of its history, far more severe than currently, and it will still be more free, open, and more liberal than China under Xi.”
Zhang observes that while many intellectuals in the country were shocked to see American colleges yield to official requests concerning diversity and inclusion practices and free speech on university grounds, in China, leading institutions are all state-owned by default. Administrators, which are appointed by the state, “have no liberty of saying no. They can’t afford defy orders.”
Nevertheless, people in the US are starting to take precautions that were once confined to repressive regimes. An academic at an American college who was previously outspoken on US-China issues declined to speak for this piece. He said: “Honestly, I am scared of the censorship in the US: I genuinely feel less afraid to criticise Xi these days than say anything bad
