As Vickie Wang, a rising comedic talent, steps onto the stage in New York, she's not just considering which jokes to deliver. Additionally, she weighs what subjects to steer clear of. “I refrain from directly attacking the government,” she explained. Or if she ventures there, she ensures it's not captured for social media. “I would never publish openly material where I openly disparage authorities … I think it's a learned behavior acquired back home.”
Wang, thirty-nine, lived in the Chinese metropolis for nearly ten years, leaving in 2022. By 2025, she moved to the US. When she got there, she dove into an intense period of “overindulging on democracy,” going to talks, protests, and exploring New York’s public library.
But over the past year after Donald Trump returned to office for the second time, there's been a noticeable shift in the environment, she says. “In China, I understood the boundaries, whereas here I'm standing on unstable ground.”
Wang’s fears mirror an emerging political reality in the US which many Chinese, or those who have lived in China, find eerily similar. Opponents face exclusion. The leader expects total allegiance. Journalists face scrutiny. Institutions are attacked.
The president has openly expressed regarding his respect for Xi Jinping, China’s authoritarian figure. He's called Xi as a “great guy”. When they reached a temporary truce in the trade war recently, the bonhomie between both figures of countries with vastly different governance models became clear. Following years of optimism in the US that closer ties with the East could assist the rising power to liberalise, under Trump 2.0, it appears that the US is shifting in China's path, instead of vice versa.
“The United States is experiencing an era of cultural revolution,” said a constitutional law expert, an academic at Peking University. “The top leader, Donald Trump, is trying to rally the grassroots in order to marginalize or weaken the elite … similar to events in the country decades past.”
Since the administration unleashed the so-called a government streamlining body, or Doge, on the Washington bureaucracy early on in office, numerous Chinese observers see US politics through the lens of China's historical period. Be it the rallying of the youth to carry out presidential directives, or purging institutions of perceived enemies, Trump as viewed from China has delivered disorder reminiscent of Mao to the US, though without equivalent degrees of force.
But since the turmoil of the initial period under Trump has calmed, an unfamiliar, distinct type of climate has emerged in the country, which in different ways seems recognizable to numerous Chinese people.
‘The Beacon Is Less Bright’
The most profound parallel between the US today and the East is the suppression on free speech.
A former police officer, now a Chinese Communist party critic, found himself in the eye of a storm recently, the likes of which he’d only previously experienced in his homeland. He resided in the US for several years, after escaping the country because of harassment from the authorities.
Last fall, following the passing of Charlie Kirk, he posted that the individual was a “scumbag”. Like people across the US – who lost their jobs for expressing criticism about Kirk – he encountered significant backlash. Relatives had personal info leaked and he faced allegations of being a Chinese spy attempting to create division.
“This incident surprised me deeply. I never imagined that something like this would occur in America – what should only happen in a repressive state,” Deng said.
His backlash originated from fellow social media users, instead of the government, but such of public monitoring also has parallels with the East.
“In terms of going after dissenters and monitoring public speech on topics deemed controversial … It's appearing here,” noted Maria Repnikova, a scholar at a US university. “This is that you see in the East now as well,” she said, adding that there were now fears in America of students reporting on teachers, a form of monitoring that has been encouraged by the CCP.
Zhang, the legal expert, explained that progressive thinkers like himself once turned to America for political inspiration, in part because openly discussing internal affairs in China is risky. However, “The US is no longer some kind of ideal for Chinese liberals. America’s image has worsened across the board.”
“We once viewed America as the beacon of constitutional democracy, but since the new administration, this lighthouse seems to have become less luminous”.
Chinese liberals, who are often, behind closed doors, critical of China’s political system, are increasingly finding it more acceptable than America’s, he stated. “It’s sort of painful to accept this … but post-COVID, the government appears to be pursuing the right thing in environmental protection and promoting EVs and tech investment,” he noted, while “the West, exemplified by America, appear in decline.”
The government's purchase of stakes in US companies has prompted parallels with China, where the line between government and business is often blurred.
Recently, authorities announced it will take a shareholder in a startup focused on mineral refinement, after taking similar stakes in other companies deemed vital to national security. The deals have left some investors nervous that America is embarking on a fresh phase of government meddling in the private sector.
There are still significant distinctions between Trump’s America and China. Last month, several news organisations including the Guardian refused to sign to a defense department rule that required reporting solely on government-authorised news. American judiciary have blocked or overturned numerous presidential measures, something that would be impossible in China’s CCP-controlled judiciary.
An analyst, who established of Strategy Risks, a China-focused advisory firm, said: “The United States might face its gravest challenge of all time, far more severe than currently, and it would remain more free, more open, and liberal than the East under its leader.”
The professor observes that although numerous scholars in China were shocked to see US universities yield to government demands regarding DEI policies and open discourse on campus, in China, leading institutions are all state-owned inherently. University leaders, who are selected by the government, “have no liberty refuse. They dare not to be disobedient.”
Still, people in the US are beginning to take precautions previously confined to repressive regimes. One professor at an American college who was previously outspoken on US-China issues refused to be interviewed for this piece. He said: “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
