As Vickie Wang, an emerging comedic talent, takes the stage in the Big Apple, she's not just considering what humor to tell. Additionally, she carefully considers which topics to steer clear of. “I refrain from openly criticizing the administration,” she stated. And when she does, she ensures it's not recorded for online platforms. “I'd never publicly share content in which I directly criticize authorities … I believe it's a habit acquired back home.”
Wang, 39, resided in Shanghai for nearly ten years, departing in that year. In 2025, she relocated to the US. Upon arrival, she dove into a frenzy of “revenge bingeing on democracy,” going to talks, protests, and delving into New York’s library system.
But in the year since the president was elected again, there has been a “palpable change” in the environment, she says. “Back home, I understood where the line was, while here I find myself on shifting sands.”
Wang’s concerns mirror a new political reality in America which many Chinese, or those with experience in China, find disturbingly similar. Enemies are ostracised. The leader expects absolute loyalty. Journalists face scrutiny. Institutions come under fire.
The president has openly expressed regarding his respect for China's leader, the nation's authoritarian figure. He has described him as “fantastic”. As they agreed a brief ceasefire in economic tensions recently, the camaraderie between the two leaders of nations with vastly different political systems was evident. Following years of hope in America that closer ties with the East may help the rising power become more open, under Trump 2.0, it seems as if America is shifting in China's path, instead of vice versa.
“The United States is undergoing an era of cultural revolution,” stated a constitutional law expert, a professor at a top Chinese university. “The president, Trump, is trying to mobilise the grassroots to sideline or weaken established figures … similar to what happened in the country decades past.”
Since the administration initiated what's termed Department for Government Efficiency, or the agency, on the Washington bureaucracy early on in office, many in China see American governance through the lens of the Cultural Revolution. Whether it is the rallying of the youth to execute the leader’s will, or purging institutions of those deemed opposition, Trump from a Chinese viewpoint has brought disorder reminiscent of Mao to the US, though absent equivalent degrees of violence.
However after the upheaval of the initial period under Trump subsided, a new, different kind of climate has settled in the country, which variously also feels recognizable to many Chinese individuals.
‘The Lighthouse Is Dimmer’
The deepest parallel between Trump’s America and the East is the suppression on free speech.
Deng Haiyan, turned Chinese Communist party critic, ended up in a controversy recently, the likes of which he once faced in China. Deng resided in America for several years, after escaping the country due to harassment from officials.
Last fall, following the passing of a public figure, Deng tweeted that the individual was “despicable”. Like people across the US – many of whom lost their jobs as a result of making negative comments about Kirk – Deng faced a huge backlash. Relatives was doxed and he was accused of being a Chinese spy attempting 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 a repressive state,” he commented.
His pile on originated from online peers, instead of the government, but that kind of public monitoring also has parallels with China.
“In terms of going after dissenters and starting to surveil public speech on topics deemed controversial … That’s starting to emerge here,” said an academic, an associate professor at Georgia State University. “That’s something observed in China now as too,” she added, adding that there were now fears in America of students reporting on educators, a type of surveillance that has been encouraged by the CCP.
The professor, the legal expert, said that liberal Chinese intellectuals like himself used to look to America for ideals, in part because openly discussing internal affairs in China is risky. However, “The US is no longer a ideal for progressive Chinese. The US's reputation has declined generally.”
“We used to see the US as the beacon of constitutional democracy, but since the new administration, this lighthouse appears less luminous”.
Progressive Chinese, who are often, behind closed doors, skeptical about China’s political system, are increasingly finding it less objectionable than America’s, he stated. “It's somewhat difficult to acknowledge this reality … but post-COVID, the government appears to be pursuing the right thing in environmental protection and promoting EVs and tech investment,” he noted, while “the West, exemplified by the United States, appear declining.”
The government's purchase of shares in US companies has prompted parallels with the East, where the line between state and business is frequently unclear.
On Monday, the US government announced it would become a shareholder in a new company specialising in mineral refinement, after taking similar stakes in other companies it considers essential for national security. The deals have made certain stakeholders nervous that America is embarking on a new era of government meddling in private industry.
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 demanded they only report on approved news. American judiciary have blocked or reversed many of presidential measures, an action that is impossible in the nation's CCP-controlled legal system.
Isaac Stone Fish, the founder of Strategy Risks, a China-focused advisory firm, said: “The United States might face the worst crisis of its history, far more severe than it is now, and it would remain more free, open, and liberal than China under Xi.”
Zhang observes that although many intellectuals in the country were shocked to see American colleges capitulate to official requests concerning DEI policies and open discourse on university grounds, in the East, the top universities are publicly controlled inherently. Administrators, which are selected by the government, “have no liberty of saying no. They can’t afford defy orders.”
Nevertheless, people in the US are starting to take precautions that were once confined to repressive regimes. One professor at a US university who was previously vocal on US-China issues declined to be interviewed for this article. He said: “The truth is, I fear of the censorship in the US: I genuinely feel more comfortable criticizing China's leader these days than say anything bad
