When Vickie Wang, a rising comedic talent, steps onto her platform in the Big Apple, she's not just considering which jokes to deliver. She also carefully considers which topics to steer clear of. “I don't engage in openly attacking the government,” she explained. And when she ventures there, she ensures it isn't captured for online platforms. “I'd never publish openly material where I openly disparage the government … I think it's a learned behavior acquired back home.”
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 a frenzy of “revenge bingeing on democracy,” going to talks, protests, and delving into New York’s library system.
However over the past year after Donald Trump was elected again, there's been a “palpable change” in the atmosphere, she notes. “In China, I understood where the line was, whereas in the US I'm standing on shifting sands.”
Her fears mirror a new political reality in the US which many Chinese, or those who have lived in the country, find disturbingly familiar. Opponents face exclusion. The president expects absolute loyalty. Reporters face scrutiny. Establishments come under fire.
Trump has openly expressed regarding his respect for Xi Jinping, the nation's strongman leader. He's called him as a “great guy”. As they agreed a temporary truce in economic tensions recently, the bonhomie between both figures of nations with diametrically opposed governance models became clear. And after decades of hope in the US that closer ties with China could assist the growing nation become more open, in the current administration, it appears that the US is shifting in China's path, instead of the other way around.
“America is undergoing an era of cultural revolution,” said a constitutional law expert, an academic at Peking University. “The top leader, Donald Trump, is trying to rally the masses in order to marginalize or undermine established figures … reminiscent of what happened in China decades past.”
Ever since Trump unleashed what's termed a government streamlining body, or Doge, on federal institutions early on in office, many in China see US politics via the perspective of China's historical period. Be it the rallying of the youth to carry out presidential directives, or cleansing institutions of perceived enemies, Trump as viewed from China has brought disorder reminiscent of Mao to the US, though without equivalent degrees of force.
But after the upheaval of the early months under Trump subsided, a new, different kind of political atmosphere has settled in the country, which variously also feels familiar to numerous Chinese people.
‘The Lighthouse Is Less Bright’
The most profound similarity between the US today and China is the suppression on free speech.
Deng Haiyan, turned Chinese Communist party critic, found himself in a controversy recently, similar to what he’d only previously experienced in China. Deng resided in America for several years, having fled China due to harassment from the authorities.
In September, following the passing of a public figure, Deng tweeted that Kirk was a “scumbag”. Like people across the US – many of whom lost their jobs as a result of expressing criticism regarding him – he encountered significant backlash. His family had personal info leaked and he faced allegations of espionage seeking to divide the US.
“That event was a real shock. I hadn't thought that something like this would occur in the United States – something that should only happen in a repressive state,” he commented.
Deng’s pile on came from fellow social media users, instead of the state, but that kind of public monitoring also has parallels with the East.
“In terms of targeting those who disagree and starting to surveil public speech on topics deemed controversial … It's appearing here,” noted an academic, an associate professor at a US university. “This is observed in China today as too,” she said, adding that there were now fears in the US of students reporting on educators, a type of surveillance promoted by the CCP.
The professor, the legal expert, said that progressive thinkers like himself used to look to the US for political inspiration, in part because openly discussing internal affairs in the country is dangerous. However, “America is no longer a ideal for Chinese liberals. The US's reputation has declined generally.”
“We used to see the US as the symbol of democratic governance, but since the new administration, that guide appears less luminous”.
Progressive Chinese, who are often, at least in private, critical of the nation's governance, are increasingly finding it less objectionable than the US's, he stated. “It’s sort of difficult to acknowledge this … but after the pandemic, authorities appears to be pursuing correct policies in environmental protection and developing electric cars and tech investment,” Zhang said, while “the West, as represented by the United States, appear declining.”
The government's purchase of stakes in US companies has prompted comparisons with the East, where the line between state and private industry is frequently unclear.
On Monday, the US government stated it would become a shareholder in a startup specialising in mineral refinement, following similar stakes in additional firms it considers vital to national security. The deals have made certain stakeholders nervous that America is entering a fresh phase of state intervention in the private sector.
There are still significant distinctions between Trump’s America and China. Last month, several news organisations including the Guardian declined to agree to a defense department rule that demanded reporting solely on approved information. US courts have blocked or overturned numerous presidential measures, an action that is unthinkable in China’s party-dominated legal system.
Isaac Stone Fish, who established of a consulting firm, a China-focused advisory firm, commented: “The United States could descend into its gravest challenge of its history, orders of magnitudes worse than it is now, and it will still be more free, open, and liberal than the East under its leader.”
The professor notes that while numerous scholars in the country were shocked to see American colleges yield to official requests regarding diversity and inclusion practices and free speech on campus, in the East, the top universities are all state-owned by default. University leaders, who are selected by the state, “cannot refuse. They can’t afford defy orders.”
Still, people in the US are starting to adopt measures previously confined to more authoritarian countries. One professor at a US university who was previously outspoken on US-China issues refused to speak for this piece. He stated: “The truth is, I fear of the censorship in the US: I actually feel less afraid criticizing China's leader now than say anything bad
