As Vickie Wang, a rising performer, steps onto her platform in the Big Apple, she's not only thinking about what humor to tell. Additionally, she weighs what subjects to avoid. “I refrain from openly criticizing the administration,” she stated. And when 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 think this is a habit from China.”
The comedian, 39, lived in the Chinese metropolis for almost a decade, leaving in that year. In 2025, she relocated to the US. Upon arrival, she embarked on an intense period of “revenge bingeing on democracy,” going to lectures, protests, and delving into the city's library system.
But over the past year since the president returned to office again, there's been a “palpable change” in the atmosphere, she says. “In China, I knew the boundaries, whereas here I find myself on unstable ground.”
Her concerns reflect a new political reality in the US which numerous individuals from China, or people with experience in the country, perceive as eerily familiar. Enemies face exclusion. The president demands total allegiance. Journalists face scrutiny. Establishments come under fire.
The president has openly expressed regarding his respect for China's leader, China’s authoritarian figure. He has described him as a “great guy”. When they reached a brief ceasefire in the trade war recently, the camaraderie between the two leaders of nations with vastly different political systems was evident. And after decades of hope in the US that closer ties with the East could assist the rising power become more open, under Trump 2.0, it seems as if America is shifting in China's path, rather than vice versa.
“The United States is experiencing an era of societal upheaval,” stated a constitutional law expert, a professor at Peking University. “The president, Donald Trump, is attempting to rally the grassroots in order to sideline or undermine the elite … similar to what happened in the country half a century ago.”
Since the administration unleashed the so-called a government streamlining body, or the agency, on federal institutions at the start of his term, many in China have viewed US politics via the perspective of China's historical period. Whether it is the rallying of young people to execute presidential directives, or purging organizations of those deemed opposition, the president from a Chinese viewpoint has delivered Mao-style chaos to America, though without equivalent degrees of force.
However since the turmoil of the early months under Trump has calmed, an unfamiliar, different kind of climate has settled in the country, which in different ways seems recognizable to numerous Chinese individuals.
‘The Lighthouse Is Less Bright’
The deepest parallel between Trump’s America and the East is the crackdown on free speech.
Deng Haiyan, turned CCP dissenter, found himself in a controversy recently, similar to what he’d only previously experienced in China. Deng has lived in America for several years, after escaping the country due to harassment from the authorities.
Last fall, following the passing of Charlie Kirk, Deng tweeted that the individual was “despicable”. Similar to others across the US – many of whom were fired as a result of expressing criticism regarding him – Deng faced a huge backlash. His family was doxed and he faced allegations of being a Chinese spy seeking to create division.
“This incident was a real shock. I hadn't thought such a thing could happen in the United States – something that should only happen in a repressive state,” Deng said.
Deng’s backlash originated from online peers, rather than the government, but that kind of social surveillance also has similarities with the East.
“In terms of going after dissenters and starting to surveil open discourse about issues that are sensitive … It's appearing here,” noted Maria Repnikova, a scholar at Georgia State University. “This is observed in China now as well,” she added, stating that concerns are rising in the US of students reporting on educators, a form of surveillance that has been encouraged by the CCP.
The professor, the legal expert, said that liberal Chinese intellectuals such as him used to look to the US for ideals, in part because openly discussing internal affairs in the country is dangerous. However, “America isn't some kind of ideal for Chinese liberals. The US's reputation has worsened across the board.”
“We once viewed America as the symbol of democratic governance, but after Trump took power, this lighthouse appears dimmer”.
Chinese liberals, who are often, at least in private, skeptical about China’s political system, are increasingly finding it more acceptable than America’s, Zhang said. “It’s sort of painful to accept this reality … but after the pandemic, authorities appears to be pursuing the right thing in environmental protection and developing electric cars and investing in hi-tech,” he noted, while “the West, exemplified by the United States, seems to be in decline.”
The government's acquisition of shares in US companies has prompted parallels with China, where the line between state and private industry is frequently unclear.
On Monday, authorities announced it will take an investor in a new company specialising in mineral refinement, after taking similar stakes in additional firms it considers essential for national security. The deals have left certain stakeholders nervous that the US is embarking on a fresh phase of state intervention in the private sector.
Yet, there remain significant distinctions between the US under Trump and China. In October, several news organisations including the Guardian declined to agree to a defense department rule that required reporting solely on approved news. US courts have halted or overturned many of presidential measures, something that is impossible in the nation's party-dominated judiciary.
Isaac Stone Fish, the founder of Strategy Risks, a China-focused advisory firm, commented: “The United States might face the worst crisis of all time, orders of magnitudes worse than currently, and it would remain freer, open, and more liberal than China under Xi.”
The professor observes that although numerous scholars in the country were surprised to see US universities yield to official requests regarding diversity and inclusion practices and open discourse on campus, in the East, the top universities are publicly controlled by default. Administrators, which are selected by the state, “have no liberty refuse. They can’t afford defy orders.”
Nevertheless, people in the US are beginning to adopt measures previously confined to more authoritarian countries. An academic at a US university once outspoken on bilateral matters refused to speak for this article. He stated: “Honestly, I fear of suppression in the US: I genuinely feel less afraid criticizing China's leader these days than say anything bad
