When Vickie Wang, an emerging comedic talent, steps onto her platform in New York, she's not only thinking about what humor to tell. She also weighs what subjects to avoid. “I don't engage in openly attacking the administration,” she explained. Or if she does, she makes certain it's not recorded for online platforms. “I'd never publicly share material in which I directly criticize authorities … I believe it's a habit acquired back home.”
Wang, 39, resided in Shanghai for nearly ten years, leaving in that year. In 2025, she relocated to America. Upon arrival, she dove into a frenzy of “revenge bingeing on democracy,” attending lectures, protests, and delving into the city's library system.
But in the year since the president was elected again, there's been a noticeable shift in the atmosphere, she says. “In China, I knew where the line was, while here I'm standing on shifting sands.”
Wang’s fears mirror a new climate in the US which numerous individuals from China, or those who have lived in the country, perceive as disturbingly familiar. Opponents are ostracised. The leader demands absolute loyalty. Journalists are targeted. Establishments are attacked.
The president has not been shy about his admiration for China's leader, the nation's strongman leader. He's called him as a “great guy”. When they reached a temporary truce in economic tensions on Thursday, the camaraderie between both figures of nations with diametrically opposed governance models became clear. And after decades of optimism in America that closer ties with China could assist the growing nation become more open, under Trump 2.0, it appears that America is shifting in China's path, rather than vice versa.
“The United States is experiencing a period of societal upheaval,” said a constitutional law expert, an academic at Peking University. “The top leader, Trump, is attempting to rally the grassroots to marginalize or undermine the elite … reminiscent of events in the country half a century ago.”
Ever since the administration unleashed the so-called Department for Government Efficiency, or Doge, on the Washington bureaucracy early on of his term, numerous Chinese observers have viewed American governance through the lens of China's historical period. Whether it is the rallying of young people to execute presidential directives, or purging institutions of those deemed opposition, the president as viewed from China has brought Mao-style chaos to the US, albeit without the same levels of force.
But after the turmoil of the initial period under Trump subsided, a new, different kind of climate has emerged in the US, which variously seems familiar to many Chinese individuals.
‘The Beacon Has Become Less Bright’
The most profound parallel between the US today and the East is the crackdown on free speech.
Deng Haiyan, turned Chinese Communist party critic, ended up in the eye of a storm this year, similar to what he’d only previously experienced in his homeland. He has lived in America for several years, after escaping the country because of harassment from the authorities.
In September, after the death of a public figure, he posted that the individual was “despicable”. Like people nationwide – many of whom lost their jobs as a result of expressing criticism about Kirk – Deng faced a huge backlash. His family was doxed and he faced allegations of being a Chinese spy attempting to create division.
“This incident was a real shock. I never imagined that something like this would occur in the United States – what typically happens in a repressive state,” Deng said.
His backlash came from fellow social media users, rather than the government, but such of social surveillance bears parallels with the East.
“In terms of going after dissenters and starting to surveil public speech about issues deemed controversial … It's appearing here,” said an academic, a scholar at Georgia State University. “That’s something that you see in the East today as well,” she said, adding that concerns are rising in America of pupils informing against educators, a type of monitoring that has been encouraged by the CCP.
The professor, the legal expert, explained that liberal Chinese intellectuals such as him used to look to America for political inspiration, since public debate on domestic politics in China is dangerous. But now, “The US is no longer a god for progressive Chinese. The US's reputation has worsened across the board.”
“We used to see the US as the symbol of democratic governance, but after Trump took power, this lighthouse seems to have become less luminous”.
Progressive Chinese, typically, at least in private, critical of the nation's governance, are increasingly finding it more acceptable than America’s, Zhang said. “It’s sort of painful to accept this reality … but after the pandemic, authorities appears to be pursuing the right thing in environmental protection and developing electric cars and tech investment,” he noted, while “the West, as represented by America, appear in decline.”
The Trump administration’s purchase of shares in US companies has prompted parallels with the East, where the line between government and private industry is often blurred.
On Monday, authorities stated it would become an investor in a new company specialising in mineral refinement, after taking similar stakes in other companies it considers essential for the country's safety. These moves have made certain stakeholders nervous that the US is entering a new era of state intervention in private industry.
Yet, there remain major differences between the US under Trump and the East. Last month, multiple media outlets including the Guardian declined to agree to a Pentagon policy that required they only report on approved news. US courts have blocked or reversed numerous presidential measures, an action that would be unthinkable in China’s party-dominated legal system.
An analyst, the founder of Strategy Risks, a China-focused advisory firm, commented: “America might face the worst crisis of all time, far more severe than it is now, and it would remain more free, open, and liberal than China under Xi.”
The professor notes that although many intellectuals in the country were shocked to see American colleges capitulate to government demands regarding DEI policies and free speech on university grounds, in the East, the top universities are publicly controlled inherently. University leaders, which are appointed by the government, “have no liberty refuse. They can’t afford to be disobedient.”
Nevertheless, people in the US are starting to take precautions previously associated with more authoritarian countries. An academic at a US university once outspoken on bilateral matters declined to speak for this article. He stated: “The truth is, I am scared of suppression here: I genuinely feel more comfortable to criticise Xi now than say anything bad
