When Vickie Wang, an emerging comedic talent, takes the stage in the Big Apple, she is not only thinking about which jokes to tell. Additionally, she carefully considers which topics to steer clear of. “I refrain from directly attacking the administration,” she stated. Or if she ventures there, she ensures it's not recorded for online platforms. “I would never publish openly material where I openly disparage authorities … I think it's a learned behavior acquired back home.”
Wang, 39, lived in Shanghai for nearly ten years, leaving in that year. In 2025, she moved to America. When she got there, she embarked on a frenzy of “revenge bingeing on freedom,” going to lectures, protests, and delving into New York’s library system.
But in the year after the president returned to office for the second time, there has been a noticeable shift in the atmosphere, she says. “Back home, I knew where the line was, while here I'm standing on unstable ground.”
Her concerns mirror an emerging political reality in America which numerous individuals from China, or those who have lived in China, find disturbingly familiar. Opponents are ostracised. The leader expects total allegiance. Reporters face scrutiny. Establishments are attacked.
Trump has openly expressed regarding his respect for Xi Jinping, China’s strongman leader. He has described him as a “great guy”. When they reached a temporary truce in the trade war recently, the bonhomie between the two leaders of nations with vastly different political systems became clear. And after decades of hope in America that improved relations with China may help the growing nation become more open, in the current administration, it appears as if America is being pulled in China's path, instead of the other way around.
“America is undergoing a period of societal upheaval,” stated Zhang Qianfan, an academic at a top Chinese university. “The president, Donald Trump, is attempting to rally the masses to sideline or weaken the elite … reminiscent of events in China half a century ago.”
Since Trump unleashed the so-called a government streamlining body, or the agency, on the Washington bureaucracy at the start of his term, many in China have viewed American governance through the lens of China's historical period. Be it the mobilisation of the youth to carry out the leader’s will, or cleansing institutions of those deemed opposition, Trump from a Chinese viewpoint has brought disorder reminiscent of Mao to America, though without the same levels of force.
But after the turmoil of the initial period of the new administration has calmed, a new, different kind of climate has emerged in the country, which variously also feels familiar to numerous Chinese people.
‘The Beacon Has Become Dimmer’
The most profound similarity between Trump’s America and China is the crackdown on free speech.
A former police officer, now a CCP dissenter, found himself in a controversy recently, similar to what he once faced in his homeland. Deng has lived in the US since 2019, having fled the country due to pressure from the authorities.
Last fall, following the passing of a public figure, Deng tweeted that Kirk was a “scumbag”. Similar to others nationwide – many of whom were fired as a result of making negative comments regarding him – he encountered significant backlash. His family had personal info leaked and he faced allegations of espionage attempting to create division.
“This incident surprised me deeply. I hadn't thought such a thing could happen in the United States – something that typically happens in a repressive state,” Deng said.
Deng’s backlash came from online peers, rather than the government, but that kind of public monitoring bears parallels with the East.
“In terms of going after dissenters and monitoring open discourse about issues that are sensitive … It's appearing in the US,” noted an academic, an associate professor at Georgia State University. “This is that you see in China today as well,” she added, adding that concerns are rising in the US of students reporting on teachers, a form of monitoring that has been encouraged by the CCP.
The professor, the legal expert, said that progressive thinkers such as him once turned to America for political inspiration, in part because public debate on internal affairs in China is dangerous. But now, “The US is no longer a god for Chinese liberals. America’s image has declined generally.”
“We once viewed America as the symbol of democratic governance, but after Trump took power, that guide seems to have become less luminous”.
Chinese liberals, typically, at least in private, critical of the nation's governance, are increasingly finding it more acceptable than the US's, he stated. “It’s sort of difficult to acknowledge this reality … but post-COVID, authorities appears to be pursuing correct policies in environmental protection and developing electric cars and tech investment,” Zhang said, while “Western nations, as represented by America, appear in decline.”
The government's acquisition of stakes in American firms has also drawn comparisons with the East, where the line between state and business is often blurred.
Recently, authorities announced it will take a shareholder in a startup specialising in rare earth processing, after taking similar stakes in additional firms it considers essential for national security. These moves have left certain stakeholders nervous that the US is embarking on a fresh phase of state intervention in private industry.
Yet, there remain significant distinctions between Trump’s America and the East. Last month, multiple media outlets including the Guardian declined to agree to a defense department rule that required they only report on government-authorised information. US courts have blocked or overturned numerous presidential measures, something that is impossible in the nation's party-dominated judiciary.
Isaac Stone Fish, who established of a consulting firm, a China-focused advisory firm, commented: “The United States might face the worst crisis of its history, orders of magnitudes worse than currently, and it would remain more free, open, and more liberal than the East under its leader.”
The professor observes that while numerous scholars in the country were shocked to see American colleges capitulate to official requests concerning diversity and inclusion practices and open discourse on university grounds, in the East, the top universities are publicly controlled by default. Administrators, who are appointed by the government, “cannot refuse. They dare not defy orders.”
Nevertheless, Americans are beginning to adopt measures that were once confined to more authoritarian countries. An academic at a US university once vocal on bilateral matters refused to be interviewed for this piece. He stated: “Honestly, I am scared of the censorship here: I genuinely feel more comfortable criticizing China's leader these days than say anything bad
