As Vickie Wang, an emerging comedic talent, steps onto the stage in the Big Apple, she's not only considering which jokes to tell. She also carefully considers what subjects to steer clear of. “I refrain from openly attacking the administration,” she explained. And when she does, she makes certain it isn't captured for social media. “I would never publicly share material where I openly disparage authorities … I believe this is a habit from China.”
The comedian, thirty-nine, lived in the Chinese metropolis for almost a decade, departing in 2022. In 2025, she moved to America. When she got there, she dove into an intense period of “overindulging on democracy,” attending lectures, demonstrations, and delving into New York’s public library.
But in the year after the president was elected again, there has been a “palpable change” in the atmosphere, she says. “Back home, I understood where the line was, while here I'm standing on shifting sands.”
Wang’s fears mirror a new political reality in the US which numerous individuals from China, or people who have lived 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 Xi Jinping, the nation's authoritarian figure. He has described Xi as “fantastic”. As they agreed a temporary truce in the trade war recently, the bonhomie between the two leaders of countries with diametrically opposed political systems was evident. Following years of hope in the US that improved relations with China could assist the rising power become more open, under Trump 2.0, it appears as if the US is shifting in China's path, rather than the other way around.
“The United States is undergoing an era of cultural revolution,” said a constitutional law expert, a professor at Peking University. “The top leader, Trump, is attempting to rally the grassroots in order to marginalize or undermine the elite … similar to events in the country half a century ago.”
Since the administration unleashed the so-called Department for Government Efficiency, or Doge, on the Washington bureaucracy early on in office, many in China have viewed American governance via the perspective of the Cultural Revolution. Whether it is the rallying of young people to carry out the leader’s will, or cleansing institutions of those deemed opposition, Trump from a Chinese viewpoint has delivered disorder reminiscent of Mao to America, though without the same levels of violence.
However since the upheaval of the early months under Trump has calmed, an unfamiliar, distinct type of climate has emerged in the US, which in different ways also feels familiar to numerous Chinese individuals.
‘The Beacon Is Dimmer’
The deepest similarity between the US today and the East is the suppression on free speech.
Deng Haiyan, turned CCP dissenter, found himself in a controversy this year, the likes of which he’d only previously experienced in China. Deng has lived in the US since 2019, after escaping China due to pressure from the authorities.
Last fall, after the death of Charlie Kirk, Deng tweeted that Kirk was “despicable”. Like people across the US – who were fired for making negative comments about Kirk – Deng faced significant backlash. His family had personal info leaked and he was accused of being a Chinese spy attempting to create division.
“That event surprised me deeply. I never imagined that something like this could happen in the United States – something that should only happen in a repressive state,” he commented.
Deng’s pile on came from fellow social media users, rather than the government, but that kind of social surveillance also has parallels with the East.
“In terms of targeting dissenters and monitoring public speech on topics that are sensitive … It's appearing in the US,” noted an academic, an associate professor at Georgia State University. “This is observed in the East today as too,” she said, adding that concerns are rising in America of pupils informing against educators, a type of monitoring that has been encouraged by the CCP.
Zhang, the Peking University law professor, said that liberal Chinese intellectuals like himself once turned to America for political inspiration, in part because public debate on internal affairs in the country is risky. But now, “The US is no longer a ideal for Chinese liberals. America’s image has worsened across the board.”
“We once viewed the US as the beacon of constitutional democracy, but after Trump took power, that guide appears less luminous”.
Chinese liberals, who are often, at least in private, critical of China’s political system, now perceive it more acceptable than America’s, Zhang said. “It's somewhat 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 “Western nations, as represented by the United States, appear in decline.”
The government's purchase of shares in American firms has prompted comparisons with China, where the distinction between state and business is frequently unclear.
Recently, authorities stated it will take a shareholder in a new company focused on rare earth processing, after taking comparable shares in additional firms it considers essential for the country's safety. These moves have left certain stakeholders concerned that America is embarking on a fresh phase of state intervention in the private sector.
There are still significant distinctions between Trump’s America and the East. Last month, multiple media outlets including the Guardian refused to sign to a defense department rule that demanded reporting solely on government-authorised information. US courts have blocked or reversed numerous Trump’s actions, an action that would be unthinkable in the nation's CCP-controlled legal system.
Isaac Stone Fish, who established of Strategy Risks, a China-focused advisory firm, said: “America could descend into its gravest challenge of all time, orders of magnitudes worse than currently, and it would remain more free, open, and liberal than China under Xi.”
The professor observes that while many intellectuals in China were shocked to see US universities capitulate to government demands regarding diversity and inclusion practices and free speech on university grounds, in the East, leading institutions are all state-owned by default. University leaders, who are appointed by the state, “cannot of saying no. They dare not to be disobedient.”
Still, people in the US are starting to adopt measures that were once associated with more authoritarian countries. One professor at an American college once vocal on US-China issues declined to be interviewed for this piece. He said: “The truth is, I am scared of suppression in the US: I genuinely feel less afraid criticizing China's leader these days than say anything bad
