When Vickie Wang, a rising comedic talent, takes her platform in the Big Apple, she is not just considering what humor to deliver. Additionally, she carefully considers which topics to steer clear of. “I don't engage in openly attacking the government,” she stated. Or if she ventures there, she makes certain it's not captured for online platforms. “I'd never publish openly material where I directly criticize the government … I believe this is a habit acquired back home.”
Wang, thirty-nine, resided in Shanghai for nearly a decade, leaving in 2022. In 2025, she relocated to America. When she got there, she embarked on an intense period of “overindulging on democracy,” going to talks, demonstrations, and delving into the city's library system.
But in the year after Donald Trump returned to office again, there's been a noticeable shift in the environment, she says. “In China, I understood the boundaries, whereas in the US I find myself on unstable ground.”
Her fears mirror a new political reality in America which numerous individuals from China, or those who have lived in the country, perceive as eerily similar. Opponents face exclusion. The leader demands absolute loyalty. Reporters are targeted. Institutions are attacked.
The president has not been shy regarding his respect for Xi Jinping, the nation's authoritarian figure. He's called Xi as a “great guy”. As they agreed a brief ceasefire in the trade war on Thursday, the camaraderie between the two leaders of countries with diametrically opposed governance models became clear. Following years of hope in the US that improved relations with China could assist the growing nation to liberalise, in the current administration, it appears as if America is being pulled in China's path, rather than the other way around.
“America is experiencing a period of cultural revolution,” stated a constitutional law expert, an academic at Peking University. “The president, Donald Trump, is trying to mobilise the grassroots in order to sideline or undermine the elite … reminiscent of events in the country decades past.”
Since Trump unleashed the so-called Department for Government Efficiency, or Doge, on the Washington bureaucracy at the start of his term, numerous Chinese observers have viewed US politics via the perspective of China's historical period. Whether it is the mobilisation of the youth to carry out the leader’s will, or cleansing institutions of those deemed opposition, the president from a Chinese viewpoint has delivered Mao-style chaos to the US, though absent the same levels of force.
But after the turmoil of the early months under Trump has calmed, an unfamiliar, different kind of political atmosphere has emerged in the country, which in different ways seems familiar to numerous Chinese individuals.
‘The Lighthouse Has Become Less Bright’
The most profound similarity between the US today and China is the crackdown on free speech.
Deng Haiyan, turned Chinese Communist party critic, ended up in the eye of a storm recently, the likes of which he once faced in his homeland. Deng has lived in the US since 2019, after escaping China due to pressure from the authorities.
In September, after the death of Charlie Kirk, Deng tweeted that Kirk was a “scumbag”. Similar to others across the US – who were fired as a result of expressing criticism about Kirk – Deng faced significant backlash. His family had personal info leaked and he was accused 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 should only happen in an authoritarian country,” Deng said.
Deng’s pile on came from online peers, instead of the government, but such of public monitoring also has similarities with China.
“In terms of going after those who disagree and starting to surveil open discourse on topics that are sensitive … It's appearing here,” said an academic, an associate professor at a US university. “This is observed in the East now as too,” she added, stating that concerns are rising in the US of students reporting on teachers, a type of surveillance promoted by the CCP.
The professor, the legal expert, explained that progressive thinkers such as him used to look to the US for political inspiration, in part because openly discussing internal affairs in the country is risky. But now, “America is no longer some kind of god for progressive Chinese. The US's reputation has declined across the board.”
“We once viewed America as the symbol of democratic governance, but since the new administration, this lighthouse seems to have become dimmer”.
Progressive Chinese, typically, at least in private, critical of China’s political system, now perceive it more acceptable than America’s, he stated. “It’s sort of painful to accept this … but post-COVID, the government seems to be doing correct policies in improving the environment and promoting EVs and investing in hi-tech,” he noted, while “the West, exemplified by America, seems to be declining.”
The government's purchase of shares in American firms has prompted parallels with China, where the line between state and private industry is often blurred.
Recently, authorities announced it would become a shareholder in a startup focused on mineral refinement, after taking similar stakes in additional firms deemed vital to national security. These moves have left some investors nervous that America is embarking on a new era of state intervention in private industry.
Yet, there remain significant distinctions between the US under Trump and the East. In October, multiple media outlets including the Guardian declined to agree to a defense department rule that demanded they only report on government-authorised news. US courts have blocked or overturned numerous presidential measures, something that is unthinkable in China’s CCP-controlled legal system.
An analyst, the founder of a consulting firm, a China-focused advisory firm, said: “The United States might face the worst crisis of its history, orders of magnitudes worse than it is now, and it will still be freer, open, and more liberal than the East under its leader.”
The professor notes that while numerous scholars in China were surprised to see US universities capitulate to official requests regarding diversity and inclusion practices and free speech on university grounds, in the East, the top universities are publicly controlled inherently. Administrators, which are appointed by the state, “cannot refuse. They can’t afford defy orders.”
Nevertheless, Americans are starting to take precautions previously associated with repressive regimes. An academic at an American college who was previously outspoken on bilateral matters declined to speak for this article. He said: “Honestly, I am scared of suppression here: I genuinely feel more comfortable to criticise Xi now than say anything bad