When Vickie Wang, an emerging comedic talent, steps onto her platform in the Big Apple, she's not only considering which jokes to tell. Additionally, she weighs what subjects to avoid. “I don't engage in directly attacking the administration,” she explained. And when she ventures there, she ensures it isn't captured for social media. “I'd never publish openly material where I directly criticize authorities … I think this is a habit acquired back home.”
Wang, 39, resided in the Chinese metropolis for almost a decade, leaving in 2022. By 2025, she moved to the US. Upon arrival, she embarked on an intense period of “overindulging on freedom,” attending lectures, demonstrations, and delving into New York’s public library.
However in the year after Donald Trump returned to office again, there's been a “palpable change” in the environment, she says. “Back home, I understood where the line was, while in the US I find myself on unstable ground.”
Her concerns mirror an emerging political reality in America which many Chinese, or those who have lived in China, find eerily familiar. Enemies face exclusion. The president demands absolute loyalty. Journalists face scrutiny. Institutions come under fire.
Trump has openly expressed about his admiration for Xi Jinping, the nation's strongman leader. He has described him as “fantastic”. When they reached a brief ceasefire in economic tensions recently, the camaraderie between the two leaders of countries with vastly different governance models was evident. And after decades of optimism in the US that closer ties with China could assist the rising power to liberalise, under Trump 2.0, it seems as if America is being pulled in the Chinese direction, rather than vice versa.
“The United States is experiencing a period of societal upheaval,” stated a constitutional law expert, an academic at a top Chinese university. “The president, Donald Trump, is attempting to rally the grassroots to marginalize or weaken established figures … reminiscent of events in the country decades past.”
Ever since the administration initiated what's termed a government streamlining body, or the agency, on the Washington bureaucracy early on in office, many in China see US politics through the lens of China's historical period. Whether it is the rallying of the youth to execute the leader’s will, or cleansing organizations of those deemed opposition, the president as viewed from China has brought Mao-style chaos to the US, though absent the same levels of force.
However after the turmoil of the initial period of the new administration has calmed, a new, distinct type of climate has settled in the country, which variously seems recognizable to numerous Chinese individuals.
‘The Lighthouse Has Become Less Bright’
The most profound parallel between Trump’s America and China is the crackdown on free speech.
A former police officer, now a CCP dissenter, ended up in a controversy this year, the likes of which he’d only previously experienced in China. He resided in America since 2019, after escaping the country due to pressure from the authorities.
In September, following the passing of a public figure, Deng tweeted that the individual was a “scumbag”. Similar to others across the US – many of whom were fired as a result of making negative comments about Kirk – Deng faced significant backlash. His family was doxed and he was accused of being a Chinese spy seeking to divide the US.
“This incident surprised me deeply. I hadn't thought such a thing would occur in the United States – something that should only happen in a repressive state,” he commented.
Deng’s pile on originated from fellow social media users, rather than the state, but such of public monitoring bears parallels with China.
“In terms of targeting those who disagree and starting to surveil open discourse on topics deemed controversial … That’s starting to emerge in the US,” noted an academic, an associate professor at a US university. “That’s something observed in the East today as well,” she said, stating that concerns are rising in America of pupils informing against teachers, a form of surveillance that has been encouraged by Chinese authorities.
The professor, the legal expert, said that liberal Chinese intellectuals such as him used to look to America for ideals, in part because openly discussing domestic politics in China is dangerous. However, “The US is no longer a ideal for progressive Chinese. America’s image has declined generally.”
“We once viewed America as the beacon of constitutional democracy, but since the new administration, this lighthouse appears dimmer”.
Progressive Chinese, typically, behind closed doors, skeptical about the nation's governance, now perceive it less objectionable than the US's, Zhang said. “It’s sort of difficult to acknowledge this … but post-COVID, authorities seems to be doing correct policies in environmental protection and promoting EVs and tech investment,” he noted, while “the West, exemplified by America, appear declining.”
The government's purchase of shares in US companies has prompted comparisons with China, where the distinction between government and private industry is frequently unclear.
Recently, the US government announced it would become a shareholder in a startup focused on mineral refinement, following comparable shares in additional firms deemed vital to national security. The deals have left some investors nervous that the US is embarking on a new era of state intervention in private industry.
Yet, there remain major differences between Trump’s America and the East. Last month, several news organisations among others declined to agree to a Pentagon policy that demanded they only report on government-authorised news. US courts have halted or reversed numerous Trump’s actions, something that would be impossible in the nation's party-dominated judiciary.
Isaac Stone Fish, the founder of Strategy Risks, a China-focused advisory firm, commented: “America might face the worst crisis of all time, orders of magnitudes worse than currently, and it would remain freer, open, and more liberal than the East under its leader.”
Zhang notes that although numerous scholars in the country were shocked to see American colleges yield to official requests regarding diversity and inclusion practices and open discourse on university grounds, in China, the top universities are all state-owned inherently. Administrators, which are appointed by the government, “have no liberty of saying no. They can’t afford to be disobedient.”
Nevertheless, people in the US are starting to adopt measures previously confined to more authoritarian countries. An academic at a US university once vocal on bilateral matters refused to be interviewed for this article. He stated: “The truth is, I fear of the censorship in the US: I actually feel less afraid criticizing China's leader now than say anything bad
