When Vickie Wang, an emerging comedic talent, steps onto the stage in New York, she is not only thinking about what humor to deliver. She also weighs what subjects to avoid. “I refrain from openly attacking the government,” she explained. Or if she ventures there, she ensures it's not recorded for social media. “I would never publicly share material in which I openly disparage authorities … I think this is a habit from China.”
The comedian, 39, lived in Shanghai for almost a decade, departing in 2022. By 2025, she relocated to America. When she got there, she embarked on an intense period of “revenge bingeing on freedom,” going to lectures, demonstrations, and delving into New York’s public library.
However over the past year after the president was elected for the second time, there has been a noticeable shift in the environment, she notes. “In China, I knew where the line was, whereas in the US I'm standing on shifting sands.”
Wang’s concerns reflect a new climate in America which numerous individuals from China, or people with experience in China, find eerily similar. Enemies are ostracised. The president expects absolute loyalty. Journalists are targeted. Establishments come under fire.
The president has not been shy about his admiration for Xi Jinping, the nation's authoritarian figure. He's called him as “fantastic”. When they reached a temporary truce in economic tensions on Thursday, the bonhomie between the two leaders of nations with diametrically opposed political systems was evident. And after decades of optimism in the US that improved relations with China could assist the rising power to liberalise, under Trump 2.0, it seems as if the US is shifting in the Chinese direction, instead of the other way around.
“The United States is experiencing a period of cultural revolution,” said Zhang Qianfan, a professor at Peking University. “The top leader, Trump, is attempting to mobilise the masses in order to marginalize or undermine established figures … reminiscent of events in the country half a century ago.”
Since Trump initiated what's termed Department for Government Efficiency, or Doge, on the Washington bureaucracy early on in office, numerous Chinese observers have viewed US politics through the lens of the Cultural Revolution. Be it the mobilisation of the youth to carry out the leader’s will, or purging organizations of perceived enemies, the president as viewed from China has delivered disorder reminiscent of Mao to the US, though absent equivalent degrees of violence.
But after the turmoil of the early months of the new administration subsided, an unfamiliar, different kind of climate has emerged in the country, which variously seems familiar to many Chinese individuals.
‘The Beacon Has Become Dimmer’
The deepest similarity between Trump’s America and the East is the suppression on open expression.
Deng Haiyan, turned CCP dissenter, ended up in the eye of a storm recently, the likes of which he’d only previously experienced in his homeland. Deng resided in the US since 2019, having fled the country because of harassment from officials.
In September, following the passing of Charlie Kirk, he posted that Kirk was a “scumbag”. Like people across the US – who were fired as a result of expressing criticism regarding him – he encountered significant backlash. His family was doxed and he was accused of espionage attempting to create division.
“This incident was a real shock. I hadn't thought that something like this could happen in America – something that should only happen in a repressive state,” Deng said.
Deng’s pile on originated from online peers, instead of the government, but such of public monitoring bears similarities with the East.
“In terms of targeting those who disagree and monitoring open discourse on topics that are sensitive … That’s starting to emerge here,” said Maria Repnikova, a scholar at Georgia State University. “That’s something observed in the East now as well,” she said, adding that there were now fears in the US of students reporting on educators, a type of monitoring that has been encouraged by the CCP.
The professor, the Peking University law professor, said that progressive thinkers such as him used to look to the US for political inspiration, in part because openly discussing domestic politics in China is risky. However, “America is no longer some kind of ideal for Chinese liberals. The US's reputation has declined generally.”
“We once viewed the US as the beacon of constitutional democracy, but since the new administration, that guide seems to have become dimmer”.
Progressive Chinese, who are often, behind closed doors, skeptical about China’s political system, now perceive it more acceptable than America’s, Zhang said. “It’s sort of difficult to acknowledge this reality … but after the pandemic, the government seems to be doing correct policies in environmental protection and promoting EVs and investing in hi-tech,” he noted, while “Western nations, as represented by the United States, seems to be in decline.”
The Trump administration’s acquisition of stakes in American firms has also drawn comparisons with the East, where the distinction between state and private industry is often blurred.
On Monday, authorities 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 made certain stakeholders nervous that the US is embarking on a fresh phase of state intervention in private industry.
There are still significant distinctions between the US under Trump and China. Last month, multiple media outlets among others declined to agree to a defense department rule that required they only report on approved news. US courts have halted or reversed 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, a China-focused advisory firm, commented: “America could descend into the worst crisis of its history, orders of magnitudes worse than it is now, and it would remain more free, more open, and liberal than China under Xi.”
Zhang observes that although many intellectuals in the country were shocked to see US universities capitulate to government demands concerning diversity and inclusion practices and open discourse on campus, in the East, the top universities are all state-owned inherently. Administrators, who are selected by the government, “have no liberty refuse. They dare not defy orders.”
Nevertheless, people in the US are beginning to adopt measures that were once associated with repressive regimes. One professor at an American college who was previously vocal on bilateral matters declined to speak for this article. He said: “Honestly, I am scared of the censorship here: I actually feel more comfortable to criticise Xi these days than say anything bad
