When Vickie Wang, a rising performer, steps onto the stage in New York, she's not just thinking about what humor to tell. She also weighs which topics to steer clear of. “I refrain from openly criticizing the administration,” she stated. Or if she does, she ensures it's not captured for social media. “I would never publicly share material in which I directly criticize authorities … I think this is a habit acquired back home.”
Wang, 39, resided in Shanghai for almost ten years, departing in 2022. In 2025, she relocated to the US. Upon arrival, she dove into an intense period of “overindulging on democracy,” going to lectures, protests, and exploring New York’s public library.
But over the past year since Donald Trump was elected for the second time, there's been a “palpable change” in the environment, she notes. “In China, I understood the boundaries, whereas here I'm standing on shifting sands.”
Wang’s concerns reflect an emerging climate in America which many Chinese, or those with experience in the country, find eerily familiar. Opponents are ostracised. The president demands total allegiance. Reporters face scrutiny. Institutions come under fire.
The president has openly expressed regarding his respect for China's leader, China’s strongman leader. He's called Xi as a “great guy”. As they agreed a temporary truce in the trade war recently, the bonhomie between both figures of countries with vastly different governance models was evident. Following years of hope in America that closer ties with the East may help the growing nation become more open, under Trump 2.0, it appears that the US is being pulled in China's path, instead of the other way around.
“The United States 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 masses to marginalize or undermine established figures … similar to what happened in the country decades past.”
Since Trump initiated what's termed Department for Government Efficiency, or the agency, on the Washington bureaucracy at the start of his term, many in China see American governance through the lens of the Cultural Revolution. Whether it is the rallying of the youth to carry out the leader’s will, or cleansing institutions of perceived enemies, the president as viewed from China has brought disorder reminiscent of Mao to the US, albeit without the same levels of violence.
But after the turmoil of the early months of the new administration has calmed, an unfamiliar, distinct type of political atmosphere has emerged in the country, which in different ways also feels familiar to many Chinese people.
‘The Beacon Is Less Bright’
The deepest parallel between the US today and China is the crackdown on open expression.
A former police officer, turned Chinese Communist party dissenter, found himself in a controversy recently, the likes of which he once faced in China. Deng has lived in America for several years, having fled China due to pressure from officials.
In September, after the death of Charlie Kirk, he posted that Kirk was a “scumbag”. Similar to others across the US – who were fired for expressing criticism about Kirk – he encountered significant backlash. His family was doxed and he faced allegations of being a Chinese spy seeking to create division.
“That event surprised me deeply. I never imagined that something like this could happen in America – something that should only happen in a repressive state,” he commented.
Deng’s backlash originated from fellow social media users, instead of the state, but such of public monitoring bears similarities with the East.
“In terms of going after dissenters and starting to surveil public speech about issues that are sensitive … That’s starting to emerge in the US,” noted Maria Repnikova, a scholar at a US university. “That’s something observed in the East now as too,” she said, stating that concerns are rising in the US of pupils informing against teachers, a form of surveillance that has been encouraged by Chinese authorities.
The professor, the legal expert, explained that progressive thinkers like himself used to look to the US for political inspiration, in part because openly discussing internal affairs in China is dangerous. But now, “The US isn't some kind of ideal for progressive Chinese. America’s image has worsened generally.”
“We used to see America as the symbol of constitutional democracy, but after Trump took power, that guide seems to have become less luminous”.
Chinese liberals, who are often, at least in private, skeptical about the nation's governance, are increasingly finding it less objectionable than the US's, he stated. “It's somewhat difficult to acknowledge this reality … but after the pandemic, authorities seems to be doing correct policies in improving the environment and promoting EVs and tech investment,” he noted, while “Western nations, exemplified by the United States, appear declining.”
The Trump administration’s purchase of shares in American firms has also drawn comparisons with the East, where the distinction between government and business is often blurred.
Recently, the US government stated it would become an investor in a startup focused on rare earth processing, after taking comparable shares in additional firms it considers essential for the country's safety. These moves have made certain stakeholders nervous that the US is entering a fresh phase of state intervention in the private sector.
There are still major differences between Trump’s America and China. Last month, several news organisations including the Guardian refused to sign to a Pentagon policy that demanded they only report on approved information. US courts have blocked or overturned many of presidential measures, an action that is unthinkable in the nation's CCP-controlled judiciary.
An analyst, the founder of a consulting firm, a China-focused advisory firm, commented: “America could descend into its gravest challenge of all time, orders of magnitudes worse than currently, and it will still be freer, open, and more liberal than the East under its leader.”
The professor notes that while many intellectuals in China were surprised to see US universities yield to official requests concerning diversity and inclusion practices and free speech on campus, in the East, leading institutions are all state-owned by default. Administrators, which are appointed by the government, “cannot of saying no. They can’t afford to be disobedient.”
Still, Americans are starting to adopt measures previously confined to more authoritarian countries. An academic at a US university once outspoken on US-China issues refused to be interviewed for this article. He said: “Honestly, I am scared of suppression here: I actually feel more comfortable to criticise Xi now than say anything bad
