When Vickie Wang, an emerging comedic talent, takes her platform in New York, she's not just thinking about what humor to deliver. She also weighs which topics to avoid. “I refrain from directly attacking the government,” she explained. And when she does, she ensures it's not captured for social media. “I would never publicly share material in which I directly criticize the government … I believe this is a learned behavior acquired back home.”
Wang, 39, lived in Shanghai for nearly a decade, departing in that year. In 2025, she moved to the US. When she got there, she embarked on an intense period of “revenge bingeing on democracy,” attending lectures, demonstrations, and exploring New York’s library system.
However over the past year since the president was elected again, there's been a “palpable change” in the atmosphere, she notes. “In China, I knew the boundaries, whereas in the US I'm standing on unstable ground.”
Her fears reflect a new political reality in the US which many Chinese, or those with experience in China, perceive as disturbingly similar. Opponents face exclusion. The president demands absolute loyalty. Journalists are targeted. Establishments come under fire.
Trump has openly expressed about his admiration for Xi Jinping, the nation's authoritarian figure. He has described him as “fantastic”. As they agreed a brief ceasefire in the trade war recently, the camaraderie between both figures of countries with diametrically opposed political systems was evident. And after decades of optimism in the US that closer ties with China could assist the growing nation to liberalise, under Trump 2.0, it seems as if America is shifting in the Chinese direction, rather than the other way around.
“The United States is experiencing an era of cultural revolution,” stated Zhang Qianfan, an academic at Peking University. “The president, Donald Trump, is attempting to rally the grassroots in order to sideline or weaken established figures … similar to events in China decades past.”
Ever since Trump initiated what's termed Department for Government Efficiency, or Doge, on federal institutions at the start in office, many in China have viewed American governance via the perspective of the Cultural Revolution. Be it the mobilisation of young people to execute presidential directives, or purging institutions of perceived enemies, the president as viewed from China has delivered Mao-style chaos to America, albeit without the same levels of violence.
However after the turmoil of the initial period under Trump has calmed, an unfamiliar, distinct type of climate has settled in the US, which variously seems recognizable to numerous Chinese individuals.
‘The Lighthouse Is Less Bright’
The most profound parallel between the US today and the East is the suppression on free speech.
Deng Haiyan, now a CCP critic, found himself in the eye of a storm recently, the likes of which he’d only previously experienced in his homeland. Deng has lived in America since 2019, having fled the country because of harassment from officials.
In September, following the passing of Charlie Kirk, Deng tweeted that the individual was “despicable”. Similar to others across the US – many of whom lost their jobs as a result of expressing criticism regarding him – he encountered significant backlash. Relatives had personal info leaked and he faced allegations of being a Chinese spy seeking to create division.
“That event surprised me deeply. I hadn't thought such a thing would occur in America – something that typically happens in an authoritarian country,” Deng said.
His backlash came from online peers, instead of the state, but that kind of public monitoring bears parallels with the East.
“Regarding going after dissenters and starting to surveil open discourse on topics deemed controversial … That’s starting to emerge here,” said Maria Repnikova, a scholar at Georgia State University. “This is that you see in the East now as well,” she added, adding that there were now fears in America of pupils informing against teachers, a form of monitoring that has been encouraged by the CCP.
The professor, the Peking University law professor, said that progressive thinkers like himself once turned to the US for political inspiration, in part because openly discussing domestic politics in China is risky. However, “The US isn't some kind of ideal for Chinese liberals. The US's reputation has declined across the board.”
“We once viewed America as the beacon of constitutional democracy, but after Trump took power, this lighthouse seems to have become dimmer”.
Chinese liberals, typically, behind closed doors, critical of China’s political system, are increasingly finding it less objectionable than the US's, he stated. “It's somewhat painful to accept this … but post-COVID, authorities seems to be doing correct policies in improving the environment and developing electric cars and tech investment,” he noted, while “the West, exemplified by America, seems to be in decline.”
The government's purchase of shares in US companies has prompted comparisons with China, where the line between state and private industry is frequently unclear.
Recently, the US government announced it will take an investor in a startup focused on rare earth processing, after taking similar stakes in other companies deemed vital to national security. These moves have left some investors concerned that the US is embarking on a new era of state intervention in private industry.
There are still significant distinctions between the US under Trump and China. In October, multiple media outlets among others declined to agree to a defense department rule that required reporting solely on government-authorised information. American judiciary have halted or overturned numerous Trump’s actions, an action that would be unthinkable in China’s CCP-controlled legal system.
An analyst, who established of a consulting firm, a China-focused advisory firm, said: “America might face the worst crisis of all time, orders of magnitudes worse than currently, and it will still be freer, more open, and liberal than the East under its leader.”
The professor observes that while many intellectuals in the country were shocked to see US universities yield to government demands concerning DEI policies and free speech on campus, in the East, the top universities are all state-owned by default. Administrators, who are appointed by the government, “have no liberty refuse. They dare not defy orders.”
Still, Americans are beginning to take precautions previously associated with repressive regimes. An academic at an American college once outspoken on bilateral matters refused to speak for this article. He said: “The truth is, I am scared of suppression in the US: I actually feel less afraid criticizing China's leader these days than say anything bad
