As Vickie Wang, an emerging comedic talent, steps onto the stage in the Big Apple, she is not only considering which jokes to tell. She also carefully considers which topics to avoid. “I refrain from openly criticizing the government,” she stated. And when she ventures there, she ensures it isn't recorded for online platforms. “I would never publicly share material in which I directly criticize the government … I think it's a habit acquired back home.”
The comedian, thirty-nine, lived in the Chinese metropolis for nearly ten years, departing in that year. By 2025, she moved to the US. When she got there, she embarked on a frenzy of “overindulging on freedom,” attending lectures, demonstrations, and exploring New York’s public library.
But in the year since the president returned to office again, there has been a “palpable change” in the atmosphere, she notes. “Back home, I knew where the line was, whereas here I'm standing on shifting sands.”
Her concerns reflect a new political reality in America which numerous individuals from China, or those with experience in the country, find eerily similar. Enemies are ostracised. The president demands absolute loyalty. Journalists face scrutiny. Establishments are attacked.
Trump has openly expressed regarding his respect for Xi Jinping, China’s strongman leader. He's called him as “fantastic”. As they agreed a temporary truce in economic tensions on Thursday, the bonhomie between both figures of nations with vastly different governance models became clear. Following years of hope in America that improved relations with China could assist the growing nation become more open, in the current administration, it appears as if America is shifting in the Chinese direction, instead of the other way around.
“The United States is undergoing an era of cultural revolution,” stated a constitutional law expert, an academic at a top Chinese university. “The top leader, Trump, is trying to rally the masses in order to marginalize or undermine established figures … similar to events in China decades past.”
Since Trump initiated what's termed a government streamlining body, or Doge, on the Washington bureaucracy early on of his term, many in China have viewed US politics through the lens of China's historical period. Be it the rallying of the youth to carry out presidential directives, or purging organizations of those deemed opposition, the president from a Chinese viewpoint has delivered disorder reminiscent of Mao to America, though without the same levels of violence.
But after the turmoil of the initial period under Trump subsided, a new, distinct type of political atmosphere has settled in the US, which variously also feels familiar to numerous Chinese people.
‘The Lighthouse Has Become Less Bright’
The deepest similarity between Trump’s America and the East is the suppression on open expression.
A former police officer, now a Chinese Communist party dissenter, ended up in a controversy recently, the likes of which he once faced in his homeland. He resided in America since 2019, after escaping China because of pressure from the authorities.
In September, following the passing of Charlie Kirk, Deng tweeted that the individual was “despicable”. Like people across the US – many of whom were fired for expressing criticism regarding him – he encountered a huge backlash. Relatives was doxed and he faced allegations of espionage attempting to create division.
“This incident was a real shock. I never imagined that something like this could happen in America – something that typically happens in a repressive state,” he commented.
His pile on originated from online peers, instead of the government, but such of public monitoring also has parallels with China.
“Regarding going after those who disagree and monitoring open discourse about issues that are sensitive … That’s starting to emerge here,” noted an academic, an associate professor at Georgia State University. “That’s something that you see in China now as well,” she said, adding that concerns are rising in America of pupils informing against teachers, a type of surveillance that has been encouraged by the CCP.
The professor, the Peking University law professor, explained that liberal Chinese intellectuals such as him used to look to the US for political inspiration, in part because public debate on domestic politics in the country is risky. But now, “The US is no longer a god for Chinese liberals. The US's reputation has declined generally.”
“We used to see the US as the symbol of constitutional democracy, but after Trump took power, this lighthouse appears less luminous”.
Chinese liberals, who are often, at least in private, skeptical about China’s political system, now perceive it less objectionable than America’s, Zhang said. “It’s sort of painful to accept this reality … but after the pandemic, the government appears to be pursuing correct policies in environmental protection and promoting EVs and investing in hi-tech,” he noted, while “the West, as represented by the United States, seems to be in decline.”
The government'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, authorities announced it would become a shareholder in a startup focused on rare earth processing, after taking comparable shares in additional firms it considers vital to national security. The deals have made some investors nervous that America is entering a fresh phase of government meddling in private industry.
There are still major differences between Trump’s America and China. Last month, multiple media outlets among others refused to sign to a Pentagon policy that required they only report on government-authorised news. US courts have halted or overturned numerous presidential measures, an action that would be impossible in China’s CCP-controlled legal system.
Isaac Stone Fish, the founder of a consulting firm, specializing in China, commented: “America could descend into its gravest challenge of its history, orders of magnitudes worse than it is now, and it will still be freer, more open, and liberal than China under Xi.”
Zhang observes that although numerous scholars in China were surprised to see American colleges yield to official requests concerning diversity and inclusion practices and open discourse on university grounds, in the East, leading institutions are publicly controlled by default. Administrators, who are appointed by the government, “have no liberty of saying no. They can’t afford defy orders.”
Still, Americans are beginning to adopt measures previously associated with more authoritarian countries. One professor at a US university once outspoken on bilateral matters refused to speak for this article. He said: “The truth is, I am scared of the censorship here: I genuinely feel less afraid criticizing China's leader now than say anything bad
