When Vickie Wang, a rising comedic talent, steps onto her platform in New York, she is not only thinking about what humor to deliver. She also carefully considers which topics to steer clear of. “I don't engage in directly attacking the administration,” she stated. And when she ventures there, she ensures it's not recorded for online platforms. “I'd never publish openly content in which I openly disparage the government … I believe it's a habit from China.”
The comedian, 39, resided in the Chinese metropolis for almost ten years, leaving in 2022. In 2025, she relocated to America. When she got there, she embarked on an intense period of “overindulging on democracy,” going to talks, demonstrations, and exploring New York’s public library.
But in the year since Donald Trump returned to office again, there has been a noticeable shift in the environment, she says. “In China, I understood where the line was, whereas here I find myself on unstable ground.”
Wang’s fears mirror a new political reality in America which numerous individuals from China, or people with experience in China, find eerily similar. Opponents are ostracised. The leader expects absolute loyalty. Reporters face scrutiny. Institutions come under fire.
The president has openly expressed regarding his respect for Xi Jinping, the nation's strongman leader. He has described Xi as “fantastic”. As they agreed a brief ceasefire in the trade war recently, the bonhomie between both figures of nations with diametrically opposed political systems was evident. Following years of optimism in the US that improved relations with China may help the growing nation become more open, in the current administration, it seems that the US is shifting in the Chinese direction, instead of vice versa.
“America is experiencing a period of societal upheaval,” stated a constitutional law expert, an academic at a top Chinese university. “The president, Trump, is attempting to rally the masses to sideline or weaken established figures … reminiscent of what happened in the country decades past.”
Since the administration initiated the so-called a government streamlining body, or Doge, on the Washington bureaucracy early on of his term, numerous Chinese observers see US politics through the lens of the Cultural Revolution. Be it the rallying of young people to carry out the leader’s will, or purging organizations of those deemed opposition, Trump from a Chinese viewpoint has brought Mao-style chaos to the US, albeit absent equivalent degrees of force.
But since the turmoil of the initial period of the new administration has calmed, a new, different kind of climate has emerged in the US, which variously also feels recognizable to many Chinese individuals.
‘The Lighthouse Is Less Bright’
The deepest similarity between Trump’s America and the East is the suppression on open expression.
A former police officer, turned Chinese Communist party dissenter, found himself in the eye of a storm recently, the likes of which he once faced in his homeland. He resided in America since 2019, having fled China due to pressure from the authorities.
In September, following the passing of a public figure, Deng tweeted that the individual was “despicable”. Like people across the US – who lost their jobs for making negative comments regarding him – Deng faced a huge backlash. Relatives had personal info leaked and he was accused of being a Chinese spy attempting to divide the US.
“This incident surprised me deeply. I hadn't thought that something like this could happen in the United States – something that typically happens in an authoritarian country,” Deng said.
His backlash originated from online peers, rather than the government, but that kind of public monitoring also has parallels with China.
“Regarding going after dissenters and monitoring open discourse about issues deemed controversial … That’s starting to emerge here,” noted an academic, a scholar at a US university. “This is that you see in China now as well,” she added, adding that concerns are rising in America of students reporting on educators, a form of monitoring promoted by Chinese authorities.
The professor, the Peking University law professor, explained that liberal Chinese intellectuals like himself once turned to the US for ideals, in part because openly discussing domestic politics in the country is risky. But now, “America is no longer a god for Chinese liberals. The US's reputation has worsened generally.”
“We once viewed America as the beacon of democratic governance, but after Trump took power, that guide appears less luminous”.
Progressive Chinese, who are often, behind closed doors, critical of the nation's governance, are increasingly finding it more acceptable than America’s, he stated. “It’s sort of difficult to acknowledge this … but after the pandemic, the government appears to be pursuing correct policies in improving the environment and developing electric cars and tech investment,” Zhang said, while “the West, exemplified by the United States, seems to be in decline.”
The Trump administration’s acquisition of stakes in American firms has prompted parallels with the East, where the distinction between state and private industry is frequently unclear.
Recently, the US government stated it would become a shareholder in a startup specialising in rare earth processing, after taking similar stakes in other companies it considers essential for the country's safety. These moves have made certain stakeholders nervous that the US 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. Last month, several news organisations among others refused to sign to a Pentagon policy that required reporting solely on approved news. American judiciary have halted or reversed numerous Trump’s actions, something that would be unthinkable in China’s CCP-controlled judiciary.
Isaac Stone Fish, the founder of a consulting firm, specializing in China, said: “The United States might face its gravest challenge of its history, orders of magnitudes worse than currently, and it will still be more free, more open, and liberal than China under Xi.”
Zhang observes that although many intellectuals in the country were shocked to see American colleges capitulate to official requests regarding diversity and inclusion practices and free speech on university grounds, in the East, the top universities are publicly controlled by default. Administrators, who are appointed by the government, “have no liberty of saying no. They can’t afford defy orders.”
Nevertheless, Americans are starting to adopt measures previously associated with repressive regimes. One professor at a US university who was previously vocal on bilateral matters declined to be interviewed for this article. He stated: “The truth is, I fear of the censorship in the US: I genuinely feel less afraid to criticise Xi these days than say anything bad
