As Vickie Wang, a rising comedic talent, steps onto the stage in New York, she's not only considering what humor to tell. She also carefully considers what subjects to avoid. “I don't engage in directly attacking the administration,” she stated. And when she does, she makes certain it isn't captured for social media. “I would never publicly share content in which I directly criticize the government … I believe it's a learned behavior acquired back home.”
The comedian, 39, lived in the Chinese metropolis for nearly ten years, leaving in 2022. By 2025, she relocated to America. Upon arrival, she embarked on a frenzy of “revenge bingeing on freedom,” attending talks, demonstrations, and delving into the city's public library.
However in the year after the president returned to office again, there has been a “palpable change” in the environment, she says. “Back home, I understood the boundaries, while here I'm standing on shifting sands.”
Wang’s concerns reflect a new climate in America which numerous individuals from China, or people who have lived in the country, perceive as eerily similar. Enemies are ostracised. The president demands total allegiance. Journalists face scrutiny. Establishments come under fire.
Trump has openly expressed regarding his respect for Xi Jinping, China’s strongman leader. He's called Xi as “fantastic”. When they reached a temporary truce in economic tensions on Thursday, the bonhomie between both figures of countries with diametrically opposed political systems became clear. And after decades of hope in the US that closer ties with the East may help the rising power to liberalise, in the current administration, it appears that America is being pulled in the Chinese direction, rather than vice versa.
“The United States is experiencing a period of cultural revolution,” said a constitutional law expert, an academic at Peking University. “The president, Trump, is attempting to rally the masses in order to sideline or undermine the elite … similar to events in the country decades past.”
Ever since the administration unleashed what's termed a government streamlining body, or the agency, on the Washington bureaucracy at the start of his term, numerous Chinese observers see US politics through the lens of the Cultural Revolution. Whether it is the rallying of young people to carry out presidential directives, or purging institutions of perceived enemies, the president as viewed from China has delivered Mao-style chaos to America, albeit without the same levels of force.
However since the upheaval of the early months under Trump has calmed, an unfamiliar, different kind of climate has settled in the US, which variously also feels recognizable to many Chinese individuals.
‘The Beacon Is Less Bright’
The most profound similarity between Trump’s America and the East is the suppression on free speech.
Deng Haiyan, turned CCP dissenter, found himself in the eye of a storm this year, the likes of which he once faced in his homeland. Deng resided in the US for several years, having fled the country because of harassment from the authorities.
In September, following the passing of a public figure, he posted that the individual was a “scumbag”. Similar to others nationwide – who were fired for making negative comments regarding him – Deng faced a huge backlash. His family was doxed and he faced allegations of espionage seeking to create division.
“That event was a real shock. I hadn't thought such a thing would occur in the United States – something that typically happens in an authoritarian country,” he commented.
Deng’s backlash came from fellow social media users, instead of the government, but such of public monitoring also has similarities with the East.
“Regarding targeting dissenters and monitoring public speech about issues deemed controversial … That’s starting to emerge in the US,” said an academic, a scholar at a US university. “That’s something observed in the East now as well,” she added, adding that there were now fears in America of students reporting on educators, a form of monitoring promoted by Chinese authorities.
The professor, the Peking University law professor, said that progressive thinkers like himself once turned to America for political inspiration, in part because openly discussing domestic politics in China is risky. But now, “The US isn't a god for progressive Chinese. America’s image has declined generally.”
“We once viewed America as the symbol of democratic governance, but after Trump took power, this lighthouse seems to have become dimmer”.
Progressive Chinese, typically, behind closed doors, critical of the nation's governance, are increasingly finding it more acceptable than America’s, Zhang said. “It's somewhat difficult to acknowledge this … but post-COVID, the government appears to be pursuing correct policies in improving the environment and promoting EVs and investing in hi-tech,” he noted, while “Western nations, as represented by the United States, appear in decline.”
The Trump administration’s purchase of shares in American firms has prompted comparisons with the East, where the line between state and private industry is often blurred.
Recently, the US government stated it would become a shareholder in a startup specialising in rare earth processing, after taking comparable shares in other companies it considers vital to national security. The deals have made certain stakeholders nervous that America is entering a new era of state intervention in the private sector.
There are still significant distinctions between Trump’s America and China. Last month, several news organisations including the Guardian declined to agree to a Pentagon policy that demanded they only report on government-authorised news. US courts have blocked or reversed numerous presidential measures, an action that would be impossible in the nation's party-dominated legal system.
Isaac Stone Fish, the founder of Strategy Risks, specializing in China, commented: “The United States could descend into the worst crisis of its history, orders of magnitudes worse than it is now, and it would remain freer, open, and more liberal than the East under its leader.”
Zhang observes that while many intellectuals in the country were surprised to see American colleges yield to government demands concerning diversity and inclusion practices and open discourse on university grounds, in the East, the top universities are publicly controlled inherently. University leaders, which are selected by the state, “cannot of saying no. They can’t afford to be disobedient.”
Still, Americans are starting to take precautions that were once confined to more authoritarian countries. An academic at an American college once outspoken on bilateral matters declined to speak for this piece. He stated: “Honestly, I fear of suppression in the US: I actually feel less afraid criticizing China's leader these days than say anything bad
