As Vickie Wang, an emerging performer, takes her platform in the Big Apple, she's not only thinking about which jokes to tell. She also carefully considers which topics to avoid. “I refrain from directly attacking the government,” she stated. Or if she does, she makes certain it's not recorded for online platforms. “I would never publicly share content where I openly disparage authorities … I believe this is a learned behavior from China.”
Wang, thirty-nine, lived in Shanghai for almost ten years, leaving in 2022. In 2025, she moved to the US. Upon arrival, she dove into an intense period of “overindulging on freedom,” attending talks, protests, and exploring New York’s library system.
But in the year after Donald Trump returned to office for the second time, there has been a noticeable shift in the environment, she says. “In China, I knew where the line was, whereas in the US I'm standing on unstable ground.”
Wang’s concerns reflect an emerging climate in America which numerous individuals from China, or people with experience in China, perceive as disturbingly familiar. Opponents are ostracised. The leader expects absolute loyalty. Journalists are targeted. Establishments are attacked.
The president has not been shy regarding his respect for Xi Jinping, China’s strongman leader. He has described Xi as a “great guy”. When they reached a brief ceasefire in the trade war on Thursday, the bonhomie between both figures of countries with vastly different governance models was evident. Following years of optimism in America that closer ties with China could assist the rising power to liberalise, in the current administration, it seems that America is being pulled in the Chinese direction, instead of the other way around.
“The United States is experiencing an era of societal upheaval,” said a constitutional law expert, an academic at Peking University. “The top leader, Donald Trump, is attempting to mobilise the masses in order to sideline or weaken established figures … similar to what happened in China decades past.”
Ever since Trump unleashed what's termed a government streamlining body, or the agency, on federal institutions at the start of his term, numerous Chinese observers see American governance via the perspective of China's historical period. Whether it is the mobilisation of young people to execute presidential directives, or cleansing institutions of perceived enemies, Trump from a Chinese viewpoint has delivered disorder reminiscent of Mao to America, though absent the same levels of violence.
However after the upheaval of the early months under Trump subsided, a new, distinct type of climate has settled in the US, which variously also feels familiar to many Chinese individuals.
‘The Lighthouse Is Dimmer’
The most profound similarity between the US today and China is the crackdown on open expression.
A former police officer, turned Chinese Communist party critic, found himself in the eye of a storm this year, similar to what he once faced in his homeland. Deng has lived in the US since 2019, after escaping the country due to pressure from the authorities.
In September, following the passing of Charlie Kirk, he posted that the individual was a “scumbag”. Like people across the US – who lost their jobs for making negative comments about Kirk – Deng faced a huge backlash. His family was doxed and he faced allegations of being a Chinese spy attempting to create division.
“This incident surprised me deeply. I never imagined that something like this could happen in America – what should only happen in an authoritarian country,” Deng said.
Deng’s pile on came from online peers, instead of the state, but that kind of public monitoring bears parallels with the East.
“In terms of going after those who disagree and starting to surveil open discourse about issues that are sensitive … It's appearing in the US,” noted Maria Repnikova, a scholar at Georgia State University. “This is observed in the East now as too,” she added, stating that concerns are rising in the US of students reporting on educators, a form of monitoring that has been encouraged by Chinese authorities.
The professor, the legal expert, said that progressive thinkers like himself once turned to America for political inspiration, in part because public debate on internal affairs in the country is risky. But now, “America isn't a god for Chinese liberals. The US's reputation has declined across the board.”
“We once viewed the US as the beacon of democratic governance, but after Trump took power, this lighthouse appears less luminous”.
Chinese liberals, typically, behind closed doors, skeptical about the nation's governance, are increasingly finding it less objectionable than America’s, Zhang said. “It's somewhat painful to accept this … but post-COVID, the government seems to be doing correct policies in environmental protection and developing electric cars and tech investment,” Zhang said, while “Western nations, as represented by the United States, appear in decline.”
The Trump administration’s purchase of shares in American firms has also drawn comparisons with the East, where the distinction between government and private industry is frequently unclear.
Recently, authorities announced it will take an investor in a new company specialising in mineral refinement, following comparable shares in other companies deemed essential for national security. The deals have made certain stakeholders concerned that the US is entering a new era of state intervention in the private sector.
Yet, there remain major differences between Trump’s America and China. In October, several news organisations including the Guardian declined to agree to a Pentagon policy that demanded they only report on government-authorised news. US courts have blocked or reversed many of presidential measures, something that is unthinkable in China’s party-dominated legal system.
Isaac Stone Fish, who established of Strategy Risks, a China-focused advisory firm, said: “The United States might face the worst crisis of all time, far more severe than currently, and it would remain more free, more open, and liberal than China under Xi.”
The professor observes that although many intellectuals in China were surprised to see US universities capitulate to government demands concerning DEI policies and open discourse on university grounds, in China, leading institutions are publicly controlled inherently. University leaders, who are selected by the government, “have no liberty of saying no. They dare not defy orders.”
Still, people in the US are beginning to take precautions that were once confined to more authoritarian countries. One professor at an American college who was previously vocal on bilateral matters refused to speak for this article. He said: “Honestly, I fear of suppression in the US: I actually feel less afraid criticizing China's leader now than say anything bad
