As Vickie Wang, a rising comedic talent, steps onto her platform in New York, she's not just considering what humor to tell. Additionally, she weighs which topics to steer clear of. “I don't engage in openly attacking the government,” she stated. Or if she ventures there, she ensures it isn't captured for online platforms. “I'd never publish openly content in which I openly disparage authorities … I believe it's a habit from China.”
The comedian, thirty-nine, lived in Shanghai for nearly ten years, departing in that year. In 2025, she moved to America. When she got there, she dove into a frenzy of “overindulging on freedom,” going to lectures, demonstrations, and exploring the city's library system.
But in the year after the president returned to office for the second time, there has been a noticeable shift in the environment, she says. “In China, I understood where the line was, while in the US I find myself on unstable ground.”
Her concerns reflect a new political reality in America which many Chinese, or people with experience in China, find disturbingly familiar. Opponents face exclusion. The leader expects absolute loyalty. Reporters are targeted. Establishments come under fire.
Trump has openly expressed about his admiration for China's leader, China’s strongman leader. He's called Xi as a “great guy”. As they agreed a brief ceasefire in the trade war recently, the camaraderie between the two leaders of countries with vastly different political systems became clear. And after decades of optimism in the US that closer ties with China may help the rising power become more open, in the current administration, it appears as if the US is being pulled in China's path, instead of the other way around.
“The United States is experiencing a period of cultural revolution,” said a constitutional law expert, a professor at Peking University. “The top leader, Donald Trump, is attempting to mobilise the grassroots to sideline or weaken established figures … reminiscent of what happened in the country half a century ago.”
Ever since Trump initiated the so-called a government streamlining body, or Doge, on federal institutions at the start of his term, numerous Chinese observers have viewed US politics via the perspective of the Cultural Revolution. Whether it is the mobilisation of young people to execute presidential directives, or cleansing institutions of those deemed opposition, the president from a Chinese viewpoint has brought disorder reminiscent of Mao to America, though absent equivalent degrees of violence.
However after the turmoil of the initial period of the new administration has calmed, an unfamiliar, distinct type of climate has emerged in the country, which variously also feels familiar to many Chinese people.
‘The Lighthouse Has Become Dimmer’
The deepest similarity between the US today and the East is the suppression on free speech.
Deng Haiyan, turned Chinese Communist party dissenter, found himself in a controversy recently, similar to what he’d only previously experienced in China. He has lived in the US for several years, having fled China due to harassment from officials.
In September, following the passing of a public figure, he posted that Kirk was a “scumbag”. Similar to others across the US – who lost their jobs as a result of making negative comments regarding him – he encountered significant backlash. Relatives was doxed and he faced allegations of being a Chinese spy attempting to create division.
“This incident surprised me deeply. I hadn't thought that something like this would occur in America – what typically happens in an authoritarian country,” he commented.
His backlash originated from fellow social media users, instead of the government, but such of social surveillance also has similarities with the East.
“In terms of targeting dissenters and monitoring open discourse on topics deemed controversial … It's appearing in the US,” said an academic, an associate professor at a US university. “This is observed in China now as well,” she added, adding that there were now fears in America of students reporting on educators, a form of monitoring promoted by the CCP.
Zhang, the Peking University law professor, said that progressive thinkers like himself once turned to the US for political inspiration, in part because public debate on internal affairs in China is risky. However, “The US isn't a god for Chinese liberals. The US's reputation has worsened generally.”
“We used to see the US as the symbol of democratic governance, but after Trump took power, this lighthouse seems to have become less luminous”.
Progressive Chinese, typically, behind closed doors, skeptical about the nation's governance, are increasingly finding it more acceptable than America’s, Zhang said. “It’s sort of difficult to acknowledge this reality … but post-COVID, the government appears to be pursuing the right thing in improving the environment and promoting EVs and tech investment,” he noted, while “Western nations, exemplified by America, appear in decline.”
The government's acquisition of shares in American firms has prompted parallels with China, where the distinction between government and private industry is often blurred.
On Monday, authorities stated it would become a shareholder in a new company specialising in rare earth processing, following similar stakes in additional firms deemed vital to the country's safety. The deals have made some investors nervous that America is embarking on a fresh phase of government meddling in the private sector.
There are still significant distinctions between the US under Trump and China. In October, several news organisations among others refused to sign to a defense department rule that required they only report on approved news. American judiciary have halted or reversed numerous presidential measures, an action that is unthinkable in the nation's party-dominated legal system.
An analyst, the founder of a consulting firm, a China-focused advisory firm, said: “The United States might face the worst crisis of its history, far more severe than it is now, and it will still be freer, more open, and more liberal than China under Xi.”
The professor observes that although numerous scholars in the country were shocked to see US universities yield to official requests regarding diversity and inclusion practices and free speech on university grounds, in China, leading institutions are publicly controlled inherently. Administrators, who are appointed by the government, “cannot refuse. They dare not to be disobedient.”
Nevertheless, people in the US are beginning to adopt measures previously associated with more authoritarian countries. One professor at a US university who was previously vocal on bilateral matters refused to be interviewed for this piece. He stated: “The truth is, I am scared of suppression in the US: I actually feel more comfortable criticizing China's leader now than say anything bad
