When Vickie Wang, an emerging performer, steps onto her platform in New York, she is not just thinking about what humor to deliver. Additionally, she carefully considers which topics to steer clear of. “I refrain from openly attacking the administration,” she stated. And when she ventures there, she ensures it's not captured for social media. “I'd never publicly share content where I directly criticize authorities … I believe this is a learned behavior from China.”
Wang, 39, resided in Shanghai for nearly ten years, departing in 2022. By 2025, she relocated to the US. Upon arrival, she dove into a frenzy of “revenge bingeing on democracy,” going to talks, protests, and exploring New York’s public library.
But over the past year after the president was elected again, there's been a “palpable change” in the atmosphere, she notes. “Back home, I understood the boundaries, while in the US I'm standing on unstable ground.”
Wang’s concerns mirror a new climate in the US which many Chinese, or those who have lived in China, find eerily familiar. Opponents are ostracised. The president expects absolute loyalty. Reporters are targeted. Establishments come under fire.
The president has openly expressed regarding his respect for China's leader, China’s authoritarian figure. He's called Xi as “fantastic”. As they agreed a brief ceasefire in the trade war recently, the bonhomie between both figures of countries with vastly different governance models was evident. And after decades of hope in the US that closer ties with China could assist the rising power become more open, in the current administration, it appears as if America is shifting in the Chinese direction, rather than vice versa.
“America is experiencing a period of societal upheaval,” stated Zhang Qianfan, a professor at Peking University. “The president, Donald Trump, is trying to rally the masses in order to sideline or weaken the elite … similar to what happened in China decades past.”
Since the administration initiated the so-called Department for Government Efficiency, or Doge, on federal institutions at the start in office, numerous Chinese observers have viewed US politics via the perspective of China's historical period. Be it the mobilisation of young people to execute the leader’s will, or cleansing organizations of those deemed opposition, the president from a Chinese viewpoint has brought disorder reminiscent of Mao to the US, albeit absent the same levels of violence.
But since the upheaval of the early months of the new administration subsided, a new, different kind of political atmosphere has emerged in the US, which in different ways also feels familiar to numerous Chinese people.
‘The Lighthouse Has Become Dimmer’
The deepest parallel between Trump’s America and the East is the suppression on free speech.
A former police officer, turned CCP dissenter, found himself in a controversy this year, similar to what he’d only previously experienced in China. He has lived in America for several years, after escaping China because of pressure from the authorities.
Last fall, following the passing of a public figure, he posted that Kirk was “despicable”. Similar to others across the US – many of whom lost their jobs as a result of making negative comments about Kirk – Deng faced a huge backlash. His family was doxed and he faced allegations of being a Chinese spy seeking to divide the US.
“That event was a real shock. I never imagined that something like this could happen in America – what typically happens in a repressive state,” he commented.
Deng’s pile on originated from fellow social media users, instead of the state, but that kind of public monitoring bears parallels with the East.
“In terms of targeting those who disagree and monitoring public speech about issues that are sensitive … It's appearing in the US,” said Maria Repnikova, an associate professor at Georgia State University. “This is observed in China now as too,” she added, stating that there were now fears in the US of students reporting on teachers, a type of monitoring promoted by Chinese authorities.
Zhang, the Peking University law professor, said that progressive thinkers like himself once turned to the US for ideals, in part because public debate on domestic politics in China is dangerous. But now, “America isn't some kind of god for progressive Chinese. The US's reputation has worsened across the board.”
“We used to see the US as the beacon of democratic governance, but since the new administration, this lighthouse seems to have become less luminous”.
Chinese liberals, typically, behind closed doors, critical of the nation's governance, are increasingly finding it more acceptable than America’s, he stated. “It’s sort of painful to accept this reality … but post-COVID, the government seems to be doing the right thing in improving the environment and developing electric cars and tech investment,” Zhang said, while “Western nations, as represented by America, appear in decline.”
The Trump administration’s acquisition of stakes in American firms has also drawn comparisons with the East, where the distinction between state and business is frequently unclear.
Recently, the US government announced it will take a shareholder in a new company focused on rare earth processing, after taking similar stakes in other companies it considers essential for national security. The deals have left some investors concerned that the US is entering a new era of state intervention in the private sector.
Yet, there remain 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 reporting solely on government-authorised news. US courts have halted or overturned many of presidential measures, an action that is impossible in the nation's CCP-controlled judiciary.
Isaac Stone Fish, who established of a consulting firm, specializing in China, commented: “America could descend into the worst crisis of its history, orders of magnitudes worse than it is now, and it will still be freer, open, and liberal than China under Xi.”
Zhang observes that although numerous scholars in China were shocked to see US universities capitulate to government demands regarding diversity and inclusion practices and open discourse on university grounds, in China, the top universities are publicly controlled by default. Administrators, which are selected by the state, “have no liberty refuse. They dare not to be disobedient.”
Nevertheless, Americans are starting to adopt measures that were once confined to more authoritarian countries. An academic at a US university once vocal on US-China issues refused to be interviewed for this piece. He stated: “Honestly, I am scared of suppression in the US: I actually feel more comfortable criticizing China's leader now than say anything bad
