When Vickie Wang, an emerging performer, steps onto her platform in the Big Apple, she is not only thinking about what humor to deliver. She also carefully considers what subjects to steer clear of. “I don't engage in directly attacking the administration,” she stated. Or if she ventures there, she ensures it's not captured for social media. “I would never publish openly content in which I openly disparage the government … I think it's a habit acquired back home.”
Wang, 39, resided in the Chinese metropolis for nearly a decade, leaving in that year. By 2025, she moved to America. When she got there, she dove into an intense period of “revenge bingeing on freedom,” going to talks, demonstrations, and exploring New York’s public library.
However over the past year after Donald Trump returned to office for the second time, there has been a “palpable change” in the environment, she says. “Back home, I understood the boundaries, whereas here I find myself on shifting sands.”
Her concerns mirror an emerging climate in the US which many Chinese, or those with experience in China, perceive as disturbingly similar. Enemies are ostracised. The leader demands total allegiance. Journalists are targeted. Establishments come under fire.
Trump has openly expressed about his admiration for Xi Jinping, China’s authoritarian figure. He has described him as “fantastic”. As they agreed a brief ceasefire in the trade war recently, the bonhomie between the two leaders of countries with vastly different political systems was evident. And after decades of hope in America that improved relations with China could assist the rising power to liberalise, in the current administration, it appears that America is shifting in the Chinese direction, 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 president, Donald Trump, is trying to rally the grassroots in order to marginalize or undermine the elite … reminiscent of events in the country half a century ago.”
Ever since Trump initiated the so-called a government streamlining body, or Doge, on the Washington bureaucracy at the start of his term, numerous Chinese observers see American governance through the lens of China's historical period. Whether it is the mobilisation of the youth to execute the leader’s will, or purging organizations of those deemed opposition, Trump from a Chinese viewpoint has brought disorder reminiscent of Mao to the US, albeit absent the same levels of force.
But since the turmoil of the early months under Trump subsided, an unfamiliar, different kind of political atmosphere has settled in the US, which variously also feels recognizable to many Chinese people.
‘The Lighthouse Is Dimmer’
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 recently, the likes of which he’d only previously experienced in China. He resided in America for several years, having fled the country due to pressure from the authorities.
In September, after the death of Charlie Kirk, Deng tweeted that Kirk was “despicable”. Like people across the US – who were fired for expressing criticism regarding him – he encountered significant backlash. Relatives was doxed and he faced allegations of being a Chinese spy seeking to divide the US.
“This incident surprised me deeply. I hadn't thought that something like this would occur in America – something that typically happens in an authoritarian country,” he commented.
His backlash came from online peers, rather than the government, but such of social surveillance also has similarities with the East.
“In terms of targeting those who disagree and monitoring public speech about issues deemed controversial … It's appearing in the US,” noted an academic, an associate professor at Georgia State University. “That’s something observed in the East today as well,” she added, adding that concerns are rising in America of students reporting on educators, a form of surveillance promoted by the CCP.
Zhang, the Peking University law professor, said that liberal Chinese intellectuals such as him used to look to America for political inspiration, in part because public debate on internal affairs in China is dangerous. But now, “The US isn't a ideal for progressive Chinese. America’s image has worsened generally.”
“We used to see the US as the symbol of constitutional democracy, but after Trump took power, that guide seems to have become dimmer”.
Chinese liberals, who are often, at least in private, critical of the nation's governance, now perceive it less objectionable than America’s, Zhang said. “It's somewhat painful to accept this … but after the pandemic, the government appears to be pursuing the right thing in environmental protection and promoting EVs and investing in hi-tech,” he noted, while “Western nations, exemplified by America, seems to be in decline.”
The government's acquisition of shares in US companies has also drawn parallels with the East, where the line between government and business is often blurred.
Recently, the US government announced it would become a shareholder in a new company focused on rare earth processing, following similar stakes in other companies deemed vital to national security. These moves have made some investors nervous that America is entering a new era of government meddling in the private sector.
There are still major differences between Trump’s America and the East. In October, multiple media outlets including the Guardian declined to agree to a defense department rule that demanded reporting solely on approved information. US courts have halted or reversed numerous presidential measures, an action that is impossible in China’s CCP-controlled judiciary.
An analyst, the founder of a consulting firm, specializing in China, commented: “The United States might face its gravest challenge of all time, far more severe than currently, and it will still be more free, open, and more liberal than China under Xi.”
The professor notes that while many intellectuals in the country were surprised to see US universities capitulate to government demands concerning DEI policies and free speech on campus, in the East, leading institutions are publicly controlled inherently. Administrators, which are appointed by the state, “have no liberty refuse. They dare not to be disobedient.”
Still, Americans are beginning to take precautions previously confined to repressive regimes. An academic at a US university who was previously outspoken on bilateral matters declined to be interviewed for this piece. He stated: “The truth is, I am scared of suppression in the US: I genuinely feel more comfortable to criticise Xi these days than say anything bad
