As Vickie Wang, a rising comedic talent, takes her platform in New York, she's not just considering what humor to deliver. She also weighs which topics to steer clear of. “I refrain from openly attacking the government,” she stated. And when she does, she makes certain it isn't captured for online platforms. “I'd never publicly share content in which I directly criticize authorities … I think this is a habit from China.”
The comedian, thirty-nine, resided in Shanghai for nearly a decade, departing in that year. In 2025, she moved to the US. Upon arrival, she dove into an intense period of “revenge bingeing on freedom,” attending lectures, demonstrations, and exploring the city's library system.
However over the past year after the president returned to office for the second time, there's been a “palpable change” in the environment, she says. “Back home, I knew where the line was, whereas here I find myself on shifting sands.”
Her fears mirror a new climate in the US which numerous individuals from China, or people who have lived in China, perceive as eerily similar. Opponents face exclusion. The president expects total allegiance. Reporters face scrutiny. Establishments come under fire.
The president has openly expressed about his admiration for China's leader, China’s authoritarian figure. He's called him as a “great guy”. When they reached a brief ceasefire in economic tensions on Thursday, the bonhomie between the two leaders 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 to liberalise, under Trump 2.0, it seems as if the US is shifting in China's path, instead of the other way around.
“America is experiencing an era of cultural revolution,” said Zhang Qianfan, a professor at Peking University. “The top leader, Trump, is attempting to rally the masses to marginalize or undermine the elite … similar to what happened in China half a century ago.”
Ever since Trump unleashed the so-called Department for Government Efficiency, or the agency, on the Washington bureaucracy early on of his term, many in China have viewed US politics via the perspective of the Cultural Revolution. Be it the rallying of young people to execute presidential directives, or cleansing organizations of perceived enemies, Trump from a Chinese viewpoint has delivered Mao-style chaos to the US, though without equivalent degrees of violence.
But after the upheaval of the initial period of the new administration has calmed, an unfamiliar, different kind of political atmosphere has settled in the US, which variously seems familiar to many Chinese people.
‘The Lighthouse Is Less Bright’
The deepest similarity between Trump’s America and the East is the crackdown on open expression.
Deng Haiyan, turned Chinese Communist party critic, ended up in the eye of a storm recently, the likes of which he’d only previously experienced in China. Deng resided in America since 2019, after escaping China due to pressure from the authorities.
Last fall, following the passing of a public figure, Deng tweeted that the individual was a “scumbag”. Similar to others across the US – who lost their jobs as a result of expressing criticism regarding him – he encountered significant backlash. His family was doxed and he was accused of being a Chinese spy seeking to divide the US.
“This incident was a real shock. I never imagined that something like this could happen in America – something that typically happens in an authoritarian country,” he commented.
His backlash originated from online peers, rather than the state, but that kind of social surveillance bears parallels with the East.
“Regarding going after dissenters and starting to surveil open discourse on topics that are sensitive … That’s starting to emerge here,” said Maria Repnikova, a scholar at a US university. “This is that you see in the East today as well,” she added, adding that there were now fears in America of students reporting on educators, a form of monitoring that has been encouraged by Chinese authorities.
Zhang, the legal expert, said that liberal Chinese intellectuals such as him used to look to America for ideals, since openly discussing 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 across the board.”
“We once viewed the US as the beacon of constitutional democracy, but after Trump took power, that guide seems to have become less luminous”.
Progressive Chinese, who are often, at least in private, skeptical about China’s political system, are increasingly finding it less objectionable than America’s, Zhang said. “It’s sort of difficult to acknowledge this … but after the pandemic, authorities seems to be doing correct policies in environmental protection and promoting EVs and tech investment,” Zhang said, while “Western nations, exemplified by the United States, appear in decline.”
The Trump administration’s purchase of shares in US companies has prompted comparisons with China, where the distinction between state and business is often blurred.
On Monday, the US government announced it would become a shareholder in a startup specialising in rare earth processing, after taking similar stakes in other companies it considers vital to national security. The deals have left some investors nervous that America is embarking on a fresh phase of state intervention in private industry.
Yet, there remain significant distinctions between the US under Trump and China. Last month, multiple media outlets including the Guardian refused to sign to a Pentagon policy that required they only report on approved information. American judiciary have blocked or overturned many of presidential measures, something that is unthinkable in the nation's party-dominated judiciary.
Isaac Stone Fish, the founder of Strategy Risks, specializing in China, said: “The United States might face the worst crisis of its history, far more severe than currently, and it will still be more free, more open, and more liberal than China under Xi.”
The professor notes that although numerous scholars in the country were shocked to see American colleges yield to government demands regarding DEI policies and open discourse on university grounds, in China, the top universities are all state-owned by default. Administrators, who are selected by the state, “cannot of saying no. They dare not defy orders.”
Still, Americans are beginning to take precautions previously confined to more authoritarian countries. An academic at an American college once vocal on US-China issues refused to speak for this piece. He stated: “The truth is, I am scared of the censorship here: I genuinely feel less afraid to criticise Xi now than say anything bad
