As Vickie Wang, an emerging comedic talent, takes the stage in New York, she is not only thinking about which jokes to tell. She also weighs which topics to avoid. “I don't engage in directly criticizing the administration,” she stated. Or if she does, she ensures it's not captured for online platforms. “I'd never publicly share material in which I openly disparage authorities … I think this is a learned behavior from China.”
The comedian, 39, resided in Shanghai for nearly a decade, leaving in that year. By 2025, she relocated to America. When she got there, she embarked on an intense period of “revenge bingeing on democracy,” attending talks, demonstrations, and exploring the city's public library.
But 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. “In China, I understood the boundaries, while in the US I'm standing on unstable ground.”
Wang’s concerns mirror an emerging political reality in America which numerous individuals from China, or people with experience in the country, perceive as disturbingly similar. Opponents face exclusion. The leader demands total allegiance. Reporters are targeted. Establishments come under fire.
Trump has openly expressed regarding his respect for Xi Jinping, China’s strongman leader. He has described Xi as a “great guy”. When they reached a temporary truce in the trade war on Thursday, the camaraderie between both figures of countries with diametrically opposed political systems was evident. And after decades of optimism in America that closer ties with the East could assist the growing nation become more open, in the current administration, it appears that America is shifting in China's path, instead of the other way around.
“The United States is undergoing a period of cultural revolution,” stated a constitutional law expert, a professor at a top Chinese university. “The top leader, Trump, is trying to rally the grassroots to marginalize or weaken established figures … similar to what happened in China decades past.”
Ever since the administration unleashed the so-called a government streamlining body, or the agency, on the Washington bureaucracy early on in office, numerous Chinese observers see American governance via the perspective of the Cultural Revolution. Be it the mobilisation of the youth to carry out presidential directives, or cleansing institutions of perceived enemies, the president from a Chinese viewpoint has brought Mao-style chaos to the US, albeit absent the same levels of force.
However since the turmoil of the early months under Trump has calmed, an unfamiliar, distinct type of climate has settled in the US, which in different ways seems familiar to numerous Chinese individuals.
‘The Beacon Has Become Less Bright’
The deepest similarity between Trump’s America and the East is the suppression on free speech.
A former police officer, now a Chinese Communist party dissenter, found himself in the eye of a storm recently, similar to what he once faced in China. He has lived in America since 2019, having fled the country because of harassment from officials.
Last fall, after the death of a public figure, Deng tweeted that the individual was “despicable”. Similar to others nationwide – many of whom lost their jobs for expressing criticism regarding him – he encountered significant backlash. Relatives was doxed and he was accused of espionage attempting to create division.
“This incident was a real shock. I never imagined such a thing would occur in the United States – something that should only happen in a repressive state,” Deng said.
Deng’s backlash originated from fellow social media users, instead of the government, but that kind of public monitoring bears similarities with the East.
“Regarding targeting dissenters and starting to surveil open discourse on topics that are sensitive … It's appearing in the US,” noted an academic, an associate professor at Georgia State University. “That’s something that you see in China now as well,” she added, adding that there were now fears in the US of pupils informing against teachers, a form of monitoring that has been encouraged by Chinese authorities.
The professor, the legal expert, said 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, “The US isn't some kind of ideal for progressive Chinese. America’s image has declined across the board.”
“We used to see America as the symbol of constitutional democracy, but after Trump took power, this lighthouse appears dimmer”.
Progressive Chinese, typically, behind closed doors, critical of the nation's governance, now perceive it more acceptable than the US's, he stated. “It’s sort of difficult to acknowledge this … but post-COVID, authorities seems to be doing the right thing in environmental protection and promoting EVs and investing in hi-tech,” Zhang said, while “the West, exemplified by America, seems to be in decline.”
The government's purchase of shares in American firms has also drawn comparisons with China, where the line between government and business is frequently unclear.
Recently, the US government announced it will take a shareholder in a new company specialising in rare earth processing, after taking similar stakes in other companies it considers essential for national security. The deals have left certain stakeholders concerned that America is embarking on a fresh phase of state intervention in the private sector.
There are still major differences between Trump’s America and the East. Last month, several news organisations including the Guardian declined to agree to a Pentagon policy that required they only report on approved news. American judiciary have blocked or overturned many of presidential measures, something that would be unthinkable in the nation's CCP-controlled judiciary.
Isaac Stone Fish, the founder of Strategy Risks, specializing in China, commented: “America might face the worst crisis of all time, orders of magnitudes worse than it is now, and it would remain more free, more open, and more liberal than China under Xi.”
Zhang observes that although numerous scholars in the country were shocked to see US universities yield to official requests concerning DEI policies and free speech on university grounds, in China, leading institutions are publicly controlled inherently. Administrators, which are selected by the government, “have no liberty refuse. They dare not defy orders.”
Still, people in the US are beginning to adopt measures that were once confined to repressive regimes. One professor at an American college who was previously outspoken on US-China issues refused to be interviewed for this piece. He stated: “The truth is, I am scared of suppression here: I actually feel less afraid criticizing China's leader these days than say anything bad
