As Vickie Wang, an emerging performer, takes her platform in the Big Apple, she's not just considering what humor to deliver. She also weighs which topics to steer clear of. “I don't engage in directly criticizing the government,” she explained. Or if she does, she ensures it isn't recorded for online platforms. “I'd never publicly share content where I openly disparage authorities … I believe this is a habit acquired back home.”
Wang, thirty-nine, lived in the Chinese metropolis for nearly a decade, leaving in 2022. In 2025, she relocated to the US. When she got there, she embarked on a frenzy of “overindulging on freedom,” attending lectures, protests, and exploring New York’s library system.
However in the year after Donald Trump was elected again, there has been a noticeable shift in the environment, she notes. “Back home, I understood where the line was, while in the US I find myself on shifting sands.”
Wang’s fears reflect a new climate in America which many Chinese, or those with experience in China, find eerily familiar. Opponents are ostracised. The president expects total allegiance. Reporters are targeted. Institutions are attacked.
The president has not been shy about his admiration for China's leader, the nation's authoritarian figure. He has described him as “fantastic”. As they agreed a brief ceasefire in the trade war on Thursday, the bonhomie between the two leaders of nations with vastly different political systems was evident. And after decades of optimism in the US that closer ties with the East could assist the rising power to liberalise, under Trump 2.0, it seems as if America is being pulled in the Chinese direction, rather than vice versa.
“The United States is experiencing an era of societal upheaval,” stated a constitutional law expert, an academic at a top Chinese university. “The top leader, Trump, is attempting to mobilise the masses in order to sideline or weaken the elite … reminiscent of events in China decades past.”
Ever since the administration initiated what's termed a government streamlining body, or Doge, on the Washington bureaucracy early on of his term, many in China see US politics through the lens of the Cultural Revolution. Whether it is the rallying of young people to execute presidential directives, or cleansing organizations of those deemed opposition, Trump as viewed from China has brought Mao-style chaos to America, albeit absent the same levels of force.
However since the upheaval of the initial period under Trump subsided, a new, different kind of climate has settled in the US, which in different ways seems recognizable to many Chinese people.
‘The Beacon Has Become Dimmer’
The deepest similarity between the US today and the East is the suppression on open expression.
Deng Haiyan, now a Chinese Communist party critic, found himself in the eye of a storm recently, the likes of which he once faced in his homeland. Deng has lived in America for several years, having fled the country because of harassment from the authorities.
In September, after the death of Charlie Kirk, Deng tweeted that the individual was a “scumbag”. Similar to others nationwide – many of whom were fired for making negative comments regarding him – he encountered a huge backlash. His family had personal info leaked and he faced allegations of being a Chinese spy seeking to divide the US.
“This incident was a real shock. I hadn't thought such a thing would occur in the United States – what typically happens in an authoritarian country,” Deng said.
Deng’s pile on came from online peers, rather than the government, but that kind of public monitoring bears parallels with China.
“In terms of targeting dissenters and monitoring open discourse on topics deemed controversial … That’s starting to emerge in the US,” noted Maria Repnikova, an associate professor at a US university. “That’s something that you see in China now as too,” she said, adding that concerns are rising in America of students reporting on teachers, a form of surveillance promoted by Chinese authorities.
Zhang, the Peking University law professor, explained that liberal Chinese intellectuals such as him used to look to America for political inspiration, in part because public debate on internal affairs in China is risky. However, “America is no longer some kind of god for Chinese liberals. The US's reputation has worsened across the board.”
“We used to see America as the beacon of constitutional democracy, but after Trump took power, that guide appears less luminous”.
Progressive Chinese, typically, behind closed doors, skeptical about 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,” Zhang said, while “the West, as represented by the United States, seems to be in decline.”
The Trump administration’s acquisition of stakes in US companies has also drawn parallels with China, where the line between state and business is frequently unclear.
Recently, authorities announced it would become an investor in a startup specialising in mineral refinement, following similar stakes in other companies it considers vital to the country's safety. These moves have left certain stakeholders nervous that the US is entering a fresh phase of state intervention in private industry.
Yet, there remain major differences between the US under Trump and the East. In October, several news organisations among others declined to agree to a defense department rule that demanded they only report on government-authorised news. US courts have halted or reversed numerous presidential measures, an action that is impossible in China’s party-dominated judiciary.
An analyst, the founder of Strategy Risks, a China-focused advisory firm, said: “The United States could descend into the worst crisis of all time, far more severe than it is now, and it would remain more free, more open, and more liberal than the East under its leader.”
Zhang observes that while many intellectuals in China were surprised to see American colleges capitulate to official requests regarding diversity and inclusion practices and open discourse on campus, in China, leading institutions are all state-owned by default. Administrators, who are selected by the state, “have no liberty of saying no. They can’t afford defy orders.”
Nevertheless, Americans are beginning to adopt measures that were once associated with repressive regimes. One professor at a US university who was previously outspoken on US-China issues refused to speak for this article. He stated: “Honestly, I am scared of suppression here: I actually feel more comfortable to criticise Xi now than say anything bad
