When Vickie Wang, an emerging performer, steps onto her platform in the Big Apple, she is not only considering which jokes to tell. Additionally, she weighs which topics to steer clear of. “I don't engage in openly criticizing the government,” she stated. And when she does, she makes certain it isn't captured for social media. “I'd never publish openly content in which I openly disparage authorities … I think it's a habit from China.”
The comedian, 39, lived in the Chinese metropolis for almost ten years, departing in that year. By 2025, she relocated to America. Upon arrival, she embarked on a frenzy of “revenge bingeing on freedom,” attending lectures, protests, and exploring the city's library system.
However over the past year after Donald Trump returned to office again, there has been a “palpable change” in the environment, she notes. “Back home, I understood the boundaries, whereas in the US I find myself on shifting sands.”
Her fears mirror a new climate in the US which numerous individuals from China, or people who have lived in China, find disturbingly familiar. Opponents are ostracised. The leader demands absolute loyalty. Reporters are targeted. Institutions are attacked.
The president has not been shy about his admiration for China's leader, the nation's strongman leader. He's called Xi as “fantastic”. When they reached a brief ceasefire in the trade war recently, the camaraderie between both figures of nations with diametrically opposed political systems became clear. Following years of optimism in America that improved relations with the East could assist the growing nation to liberalise, in the current administration, it appears that America is being pulled in China's path, rather than vice versa.
“The United States is experiencing an era of cultural revolution,” stated Zhang Qianfan, an academic at a top Chinese university. “The president, Donald Trump, is trying to mobilise the masses in order to sideline or weaken established figures … similar to events in China decades past.”
Ever since Trump initiated the so-called a government streamlining body, or the agency, on the Washington bureaucracy at the start in office, many in China have viewed American governance through the lens of China's historical period. Be it the mobilisation of the youth to execute presidential directives, or purging organizations of perceived enemies, the president from a Chinese viewpoint has brought Mao-style chaos to America, albeit without equivalent degrees of force.
But since the upheaval of the initial period under Trump has calmed, an unfamiliar, different kind of climate has emerged in the US, which in different ways also feels familiar to many Chinese people.
‘The Lighthouse Has Become Less Bright’
The most profound similarity between Trump’s America and the East is the crackdown on open expression.
Deng Haiyan, turned CCP critic, found himself in the eye of a storm this year, the likes of which he once faced in China. Deng resided in the US since 2019, after escaping China due to pressure from officials.
In September, after the death of Charlie Kirk, he posted that Kirk was “despicable”. Like people across the US – who lost their jobs for expressing criticism about Kirk – Deng faced a huge backlash. His family was doxed and he was accused of being a Chinese spy attempting to divide the US.
“This incident was a real shock. I never imagined such a thing would occur in the United States – what should only happen in a repressive state,” Deng said.
Deng’s pile on came from online peers, rather than the government, but such of social surveillance also has parallels with the East.
“In terms of targeting those who disagree and monitoring open discourse on topics that are sensitive … It's appearing here,” noted an academic, a scholar at Georgia State University. “This is that you see in the East today as too,” she added, adding that there were now fears in America of pupils informing against teachers, a form of surveillance that has been encouraged by Chinese authorities.
The professor, the legal expert, explained that liberal Chinese intellectuals such as him once turned to the US for ideals, since openly discussing internal affairs in China is risky. But now, “America is no longer a god for progressive Chinese. America’s image has worsened generally.”
“We used to see the US as the symbol of constitutional democracy, but after Trump took power, this lighthouse seems to have become less luminous”.
Chinese liberals, typically, behind closed doors, critical of the nation's governance, now perceive it less objectionable than America’s, he stated. “It’s sort of difficult to acknowledge this reality … but post-COVID, authorities seems to be doing the right thing in improving the environment and developing electric cars and tech investment,” Zhang said, while “the West, as represented by America, appear declining.”
The government's purchase of shares in US companies has prompted comparisons with China, where the line between state and private industry is often blurred.
On Monday, the US government announced it will take a shareholder in a startup focused on mineral refinement, following similar stakes in other companies deemed essential for the country's safety. These moves have made some investors nervous that the US is entering a fresh phase 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 including the Guardian declined to agree to a Pentagon policy that required they only report on approved news. US courts have blocked or reversed many of presidential measures, an action that is unthinkable in the nation's CCP-controlled judiciary.
An analyst, who established of a consulting firm, a China-focused advisory firm, said: “America could descend into the worst crisis 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 while many intellectuals in the country were surprised to see US universities capitulate to official requests regarding diversity and inclusion practices and open discourse on campus, in the East, the top universities are publicly controlled inherently. University leaders, which are selected by the government, “cannot of saying no. They dare not to be disobedient.”
Nevertheless, Americans are beginning to take precautions that were once associated with more authoritarian countries. One professor at an American college once vocal on US-China issues declined to be interviewed for this piece. He said: “The truth is, I am scared of suppression here: I genuinely feel less afraid criticizing China's leader now than say anything bad
