As Vickie Wang, an emerging comedic talent, steps onto the stage in the Big Apple, she is not just thinking about what humor to tell. Additionally, she weighs which topics to steer clear of. “I don't engage in directly attacking the government,” she explained. And when she ventures there, she ensures it's not recorded for online platforms. “I'd never publish openly content where I directly criticize authorities … I believe it's a learned behavior acquired back home.”
The comedian, thirty-nine, resided in Shanghai for almost a decade, leaving in 2022. In 2025, she moved to America. When she got there, she embarked on an intense period of “revenge bingeing on freedom,” going to lectures, protests, and exploring New York’s public library.
However in the year after Donald Trump returned to office again, there's been a “palpable change” in the environment, she says. “Back home, I knew the boundaries, whereas in the US I find myself on unstable ground.”
Her fears reflect an emerging climate in the US which numerous individuals from China, or those with experience in China, find disturbingly similar. Enemies face exclusion. The leader demands absolute loyalty. Reporters are targeted. Institutions come under fire.
The president has openly expressed regarding his respect for Xi Jinping, China’s authoritarian figure. He's called him as “fantastic”. When they reached a brief ceasefire in the trade war recently, the camaraderie between the two leaders of nations with vastly different governance models was evident. And after decades of optimism in America that improved relations with China may help the rising power become more open, under Trump 2.0, it seems that the US is being pulled in China's path, rather than the other way around.
“America is experiencing a period of societal upheaval,” stated Zhang Qianfan, an academic at Peking University. “The president, Trump, is attempting to mobilise the masses in order to marginalize or undermine established figures … reminiscent of what happened in the country decades past.”
Ever since Trump initiated what's termed a government streamlining body, or the agency, on the Washington bureaucracy early on of his term, many in China see American governance via the perspective of the Cultural Revolution. Whether it is the rallying of young people to carry out presidential directives, or purging institutions of those deemed opposition, the president as viewed from China has delivered Mao-style chaos to America, albeit absent the same levels of violence.
However after the turmoil of the early months of the new administration subsided, a new, distinct type of climate has settled in the country, which in different ways seems recognizable to many Chinese people.
‘The Beacon Has Become Dimmer’
The most profound parallel between the US today and China is the crackdown 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 China. He has lived in the US since 2019, having fled the country due to pressure from officials.
In September, following the passing of Charlie Kirk, he posted that Kirk was “despicable”. Like people nationwide – many of whom were fired as a result of expressing criticism about Kirk – Deng faced a huge 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 never imagined that something like this could happen in America – what typically happens in a repressive state,” he commented.
His backlash came from fellow social media users, instead of the government, but that kind of social surveillance also has similarities with China.
“Regarding going after those who disagree and starting to surveil public speech about issues that are sensitive … That’s starting to emerge here,” noted Maria Repnikova, an associate professor at Georgia State University. “This is observed in the East now as well,” she added, stating that there were now fears in the US of students reporting on teachers, a form of monitoring that has been encouraged by the CCP.
The professor, the legal expert, said that liberal Chinese intellectuals such as him once turned to America for ideals, in part because public debate on internal affairs in China is dangerous. However, “The US is no longer a god for progressive Chinese. America’s image has declined generally.”
“We once viewed America as the beacon of democratic governance, but since the new administration, this lighthouse seems to have become dimmer”.
Chinese liberals, who are often, at least in private, critical of the nation's governance, are increasingly finding it more acceptable than the US's, Zhang said. “It’s sort of painful to accept this … but after the pandemic, the government appears to be pursuing the right thing in environmental protection and developing electric cars and investing in hi-tech,” he noted, while “Western nations, exemplified by America, appear declining.”
The Trump administration’s purchase of stakes in American firms has prompted parallels with the East, where the line between government and private industry is often blurred.
Recently, authorities stated it would become an investor in a new company specialising in mineral refinement, after taking similar stakes in additional firms it considers essential for national security. These moves have made some investors concerned that the US is embarking on a new era of government meddling in private industry.
Yet, there remain major differences between the US under Trump and the East. Last month, several news organisations including the Guardian declined to agree to a defense department rule that demanded they only report on approved news. American judiciary have blocked or reversed many of Trump’s actions, an action that would be unthinkable in the nation's CCP-controlled legal system.
An analyst, the founder of a consulting firm, specializing in China, commented: “America could descend into the worst crisis of all time, far more severe than currently, and it would remain more free, more open, and liberal than the East under its leader.”
The professor observes that while numerous scholars in China were surprised to see US universities yield to government demands regarding diversity and inclusion practices and open discourse on university grounds, in China, the top universities are publicly controlled by default. Administrators, which are selected by the government, “cannot of saying no. They can’t afford defy orders.”
Still, people in the US are starting to take precautions that were once associated with repressive regimes. One professor at an American college once vocal on US-China issues declined to speak for this article. He said: “Honestly, I am scared of the censorship here: I actually feel less afraid criticizing China's leader these days than say anything bad
