When Vickie Wang, a rising comedic talent, takes the stage in New York, she is not just thinking about which jokes to deliver. Additionally, she weighs which topics to steer clear of. “I refrain from openly criticizing the government,” she stated. Or if she ventures there, she makes certain it's not captured for online platforms. “I'd never publish openly material in which I openly disparage the government … I think it's a learned behavior acquired back home.”
The comedian, 39, resided in Shanghai for nearly ten years, departing in 2022. In 2025, she relocated to the US. When she got there, she dove into a frenzy of “revenge bingeing on freedom,” going to lectures, protests, and delving into New York’s public library.
However in the year after Donald Trump was elected again, there's been a noticeable shift in the environment, she notes. “In China, I understood where the line was, while here I'm standing on unstable ground.”
Her concerns reflect an emerging climate in America which many Chinese, or people with experience in the country, perceive as disturbingly similar. Enemies face exclusion. The leader expects absolute loyalty. Journalists face scrutiny. Establishments are attacked.
The president has not been shy about his admiration for Xi Jinping, the nation's strongman leader. He's called Xi as “fantastic”. When they reached a brief ceasefire in the trade war on Thursday, the bonhomie between both figures of nations with diametrically opposed political systems became clear. Following years of optimism in America that improved relations with the East may help the rising power become more open, in the current administration, it appears that the US 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, a professor at a top Chinese university. “The president, Donald Trump, is trying to mobilise the grassroots in order to marginalize or undermine the elite … similar to what happened in the country half a century ago.”
Ever since the administration initiated the so-called Department for Government Efficiency, or the agency, on the Washington bureaucracy early on in office, numerous Chinese observers have viewed US politics via the perspective of China's historical period. Be it the mobilisation of young people to carry out the leader’s will, or purging organizations of perceived enemies, Trump as viewed from China has delivered Mao-style chaos to the US, albeit absent the same levels of force.
But after the turmoil of the initial period under Trump has calmed, a new, different kind of climate has emerged in the country, which in different ways seems familiar to many Chinese individuals.
‘The Beacon Has Become Dimmer’
The most profound parallel between Trump’s America and the East is the crackdown on open expression.
Deng Haiyan, turned CCP dissenter, ended up in a controversy this year, similar to what he once faced in China. He has lived in America for several years, having fled the country because of harassment from officials.
Last fall, after the death of a public figure, Deng tweeted that the individual was a “scumbag”. Like people nationwide – many of whom lost their jobs for expressing criticism about Kirk – Deng faced significant backlash. Relatives had personal info leaked and he faced allegations of being a Chinese spy attempting to create division.
“That event surprised me deeply. I hadn't thought such a thing would occur in the United States – what typically happens in an authoritarian country,” he commented.
His pile on came from fellow social media users, rather than the government, but that kind of social surveillance also has similarities with the East.
“Regarding targeting dissenters and starting to surveil open discourse about issues that are sensitive … That’s starting to emerge in the US,” noted an academic, a scholar at Georgia State University. “This is observed in the East now as well,” she said, stating that concerns are rising in America of pupils informing against teachers, a form of surveillance promoted by the CCP.
Zhang, the Peking University law professor, explained that liberal Chinese intellectuals such as him once turned to the US for political inspiration, in part because public debate on internal affairs in the country is dangerous. However, “America is no longer a god for progressive Chinese. America’s image has declined across the board.”
“We used to see America as the symbol of constitutional democracy, but since the new administration, that guide appears less luminous”.
Chinese liberals, typically, behind closed doors, skeptical about the nation's governance, now perceive it more acceptable than the US's, Zhang said. “It's somewhat painful to accept this reality … but post-COVID, the government seems to be doing the right thing in improving the environment and promoting EVs and investing in hi-tech,” Zhang said, while “the West, exemplified by America, appear in decline.”
The government's purchase of shares in US companies has prompted comparisons with the East, where the line between government and private industry is often blurred.
On Monday, the US government announced it will take a shareholder in a startup focused on rare earth processing, after taking comparable shares in other companies it considers essential for national security. The deals have left some investors concerned that the US is entering a fresh phase of state intervention in the private sector.
Yet, there remain major differences between Trump’s America and the East. In October, several news organisations including the Guardian refused to sign to a defense department rule that demanded they only report on approved information. US courts have halted or overturned many of presidential measures, an action that is impossible in China’s CCP-controlled legal system.
An analyst, who established of Strategy Risks, a China-focused advisory firm, said: “The United States might face its gravest challenge of all time, orders of magnitudes worse than it is now, and it would remain more free, more open, and liberal than the East under its leader.”
The professor notes that while many intellectuals in the country were shocked to see US universities capitulate to official requests regarding diversity and inclusion practices and open discourse on university grounds, in China, leading institutions are all state-owned by default. University leaders, which are appointed by the government, “have no liberty of saying no. They dare not defy orders.”
Nevertheless, people in the US are starting to adopt measures previously confined to repressive regimes. One professor at an American college who was previously vocal on US-China issues refused to be interviewed for this piece. He stated: “Honestly, I fear of the censorship here: I genuinely feel less afraid criticizing China's leader these days than say anything bad
