As Vickie Wang, an emerging comedic talent, takes the stage in the Big Apple, she's not only thinking about which jokes to tell. Additionally, she carefully considers what subjects to avoid. “I don't engage in directly criticizing the administration,” she stated. Or if she ventures there, she ensures it isn't recorded for online platforms. “I would never publicly share content in which I directly criticize the government … I believe it's a learned behavior acquired back home.”
Wang, 39, resided in Shanghai for nearly a decade, departing in 2022. By 2025, she moved to the US. When she got there, she dove into a frenzy of “overindulging on democracy,” attending talks, protests, and exploring the city's public library.
However over the past year after the president returned to office again, there's been a “palpable change” in the atmosphere, she notes. “Back home, I knew where the line was, while here I find myself on unstable ground.”
Wang’s concerns reflect a new climate in the US which many Chinese, or people who have lived in China, perceive as disturbingly similar. Opponents face exclusion. The leader demands absolute loyalty. Reporters are targeted. Establishments are attacked.
Trump has not been shy about his admiration for Xi Jinping, China’s strongman leader. He has described him as “fantastic”. As they agreed a brief ceasefire in economic tensions recently, the camaraderie between both figures of countries with diametrically opposed political systems was evident. And after decades of hope in America that closer ties with China may help the growing nation to liberalise, under Trump 2.0, it appears that the US is being pulled in the Chinese direction, rather than the other way around.
“America is undergoing an era of cultural revolution,” stated a constitutional law expert, a professor at a top Chinese university. “The president, Trump, is trying to mobilise the grassroots to marginalize or weaken the elite … reminiscent of what happened in the country decades past.”
Since Trump unleashed the so-called a government streamlining body, or the agency, on the Washington bureaucracy at the start of his term, many in China have viewed US politics via the perspective of the Cultural Revolution. Be it the rallying of young people to execute presidential directives, or purging institutions of those deemed opposition, the president as viewed from China has brought Mao-style chaos to America, though absent the same levels of force.
But since the turmoil of the early months under Trump subsided, an unfamiliar, distinct type of political atmosphere has settled in the US, which in different ways also feels familiar to many Chinese people.
‘The Beacon Has Become Dimmer’
The deepest similarity between the US today and China is the suppression on open expression.
Deng Haiyan, now a CCP dissenter, found himself in a controversy recently, the likes of which he once faced in China. Deng has lived in America for several years, after escaping the country due to pressure from the authorities.
Last fall, after the death of Charlie Kirk, he posted that Kirk was a “scumbag”. Similar to others across the US – many of whom lost their jobs for making negative comments about Kirk – he encountered significant backlash. Relatives was doxed and he was accused of espionage attempting to create division.
“This incident surprised me deeply. I never imagined that something like this would occur in America – what typically happens in an authoritarian country,” Deng said.
Deng’s backlash originated from fellow social media users, instead of the state, but such of public monitoring also has parallels with China.
“In terms of targeting dissenters and monitoring open discourse about issues that are sensitive … It's appearing here,” noted Maria Repnikova, an associate professor at a US university. “This is that you see in China now as too,” she said, adding that there were now fears in America of students reporting on educators, a type of surveillance promoted by Chinese authorities.
Zhang, the Peking University law professor, explained that progressive thinkers like himself used to look to America for ideals, since public debate on internal affairs in the country is risky. But now, “America is no longer a ideal for progressive Chinese. America’s image has worsened generally.”
“We once viewed America as the beacon of democratic governance, but since the new administration, that guide appears less luminous”.
Chinese liberals, who are often, at least in private, skeptical about China’s political system, are increasingly finding it less objectionable than America’s, he stated. “It’s sort of difficult to acknowledge 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,” Zhang said, while “Western nations, as represented by the United States, appear in decline.”
The Trump administration’s purchase of shares in American firms has prompted parallels with the East, where the line between state and private industry is often blurred.
On Monday, authorities announced it would become an investor in a startup specialising in rare earth processing, after taking similar stakes in other companies it considers vital to national security. The deals have made certain stakeholders nervous that America is embarking on a new era of state intervention in the private sector.
Yet, there remain significant distinctions between the US under Trump and the East. In October, several news organisations including the Guardian refused to sign to a Pentagon policy that required they only report on approved news. US courts have blocked or overturned many of Trump’s actions, an action that would be unthinkable in China’s party-dominated judiciary.
An analyst, the founder of a consulting firm, specializing in China, commented: “America might face the worst crisis of its history, far more severe than currently, and it will still be freer, more open, and liberal than the East under its leader.”
Zhang observes that while many intellectuals in the country were shocked to see US universities capitulate to government demands concerning DEI policies and open discourse on university grounds, in the East, the top universities are publicly controlled by default. Administrators, which are appointed by the state, “have no liberty refuse. They dare not defy orders.”
Still, Americans are starting to take precautions that were once confined to repressive regimes. An academic at an American college who was previously vocal on US-China issues declined to speak for this article. He said: “Honestly, I am scared of suppression in the US: I actually feel more comfortable criticizing China's leader now than say anything bad
