As Vickie Wang, a rising performer, steps onto the stage in the Big Apple, she's not only thinking about which jokes to tell. She also carefully considers which topics to avoid. “I refrain from openly criticizing the administration,” she stated. Or if she does, she makes certain it isn't recorded for online platforms. “I would never publicly share material where I openly disparage authorities … I believe this is a learned behavior from China.”
The comedian, 39, resided in Shanghai for almost ten years, departing in 2022. In 2025, she relocated to the US. When she got there, she embarked on an intense period of “overindulging on freedom,” attending lectures, demonstrations, and delving into the city's library system.
However over the past year after the president returned to office for the second time, there's been a “palpable change” in the atmosphere, she notes. “Back home, I knew the boundaries, whereas in the US I find myself on shifting sands.”
Wang’s concerns mirror a new political reality in America which numerous individuals from China, or people with experience in China, find eerily similar. Enemies face exclusion. The leader expects absolute loyalty. Reporters face scrutiny. Establishments are attacked.
The president has openly expressed about his admiration for China's leader, the nation's authoritarian figure. He's called him as a “great guy”. When they reached a brief ceasefire in the trade war on Thursday, the camaraderie between the two leaders of countries with diametrically opposed political systems became clear. Following years of optimism in America that improved relations with the East could assist the growing nation become more open, in the current administration, it seems as if the US is being pulled in the Chinese direction, rather than vice versa.
“America is experiencing an era of societal upheaval,” said a constitutional law expert, an academic at a top Chinese university. “The top leader, Donald Trump, is attempting to mobilise the grassroots to sideline or weaken established figures … similar to events in China half a century ago.”
Since the administration unleashed the so-called a government streamlining body, or the agency, on federal institutions at the start in office, numerous Chinese observers see US politics via the perspective of the Cultural Revolution. Be it the mobilisation of young people to carry out the leader’s will, or cleansing institutions of perceived enemies, the president from a Chinese viewpoint has delivered Mao-style chaos to the US, albeit without equivalent degrees of force.
However after the upheaval of the initial period under Trump subsided, an unfamiliar, distinct type of climate has settled in the country, which in different ways also feels recognizable to many Chinese individuals.
‘The Lighthouse Is Dimmer’
The deepest similarity between the US today and the East is the crackdown on free speech.
A former police officer, turned Chinese Communist party dissenter, ended up in the eye of a storm recently, similar to what he once faced in China. Deng has lived in America since 2019, having fled the country due to pressure from officials.
In September, after the death of a public figure, Deng tweeted that the individual was “despicable”. Like people nationwide – who were fired as a result of making negative comments regarding him – Deng faced significant backlash. His family was doxed and he was accused of espionage seeking to create division.
“This incident surprised me deeply. I never imagined that something like this would occur in the United States – something that typically happens in a repressive state,” Deng said.
His pile on came from online peers, rather than the government, but such of public monitoring also has parallels with China.
“In terms of targeting dissenters and starting to surveil open discourse about issues that are sensitive … That’s starting to emerge here,” noted an academic, a scholar at a US university. “This is observed in the East now as well,” she added, stating that there were now fears in the US of pupils informing against educators, a type of surveillance that has been encouraged by Chinese authorities.
The professor, the Peking University law professor, explained that progressive thinkers such as him used to look to America for political inspiration, in part because openly discussing internal affairs in China is risky. However, “The US isn't a god for progressive Chinese. The US's reputation has declined across the board.”
“We once viewed America as the beacon of democratic governance, but after Trump took power, that guide appears less luminous”.
Chinese liberals, who are often, behind closed doors, skeptical about the nation's governance, are increasingly finding it more acceptable 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,” Zhang said, while “Western nations, as represented by the United States, seems to be declining.”
The Trump administration’s purchase of shares in US companies has prompted comparisons with China, where the line between government and private industry is frequently unclear.
On Monday, the US government stated it would become a shareholder in a new company focused on mineral refinement, following comparable shares in other companies it considers vital to national security. These moves have left some investors nervous that the US is embarking on a fresh phase of government meddling in private industry.
Yet, there remain significant distinctions between the US under Trump and China. Last month, multiple media outlets including the Guardian declined to agree to a defense department rule that required reporting solely on approved information. US courts have halted or reversed numerous Trump’s actions, an action that would be impossible in the nation's party-dominated legal system.
Isaac Stone Fish, who established of a consulting firm, specializing in China, said: “America could descend into the worst crisis of its history, orders of magnitudes worse than currently, and it would remain more free, open, and liberal than the East under its leader.”
Zhang notes that while many intellectuals in China were shocked to see American colleges yield to government demands regarding DEI policies and open discourse on campus, in the East, leading institutions are all state-owned inherently. University leaders, which are selected by the government, “have no liberty refuse. They can’t afford to be disobedient.”
Still, Americans are beginning to adopt measures that were once confined to more authoritarian countries. One professor at an American college who was previously vocal on bilateral matters declined to be interviewed for this piece. He stated: “The truth is, I fear of suppression in the US: I actually feel more comfortable criticizing China's leader these days than say anything bad
