When Vickie Wang, an emerging performer, takes the stage in New York, she's not only thinking about which jokes to tell. Additionally, she weighs which topics to avoid. “I refrain from openly criticizing the administration,” she stated. And when she ventures there, she makes certain it isn't captured for online platforms. “I'd never publish openly material where I openly disparage the government … I believe it's a habit acquired back home.”
The comedian, 39, resided in the Chinese metropolis for almost a decade, leaving in 2022. By 2025, she moved to America. When she got there, she embarked on a frenzy of “revenge bingeing on democracy,” attending talks, protests, and delving into New York’s public library.
But in the year after the president was elected again, there's been a noticeable shift in the environment, she notes. “In China, I understood the boundaries, whereas here I find myself on unstable ground.”
Her fears mirror a new climate in the US which many Chinese, or people with experience in China, find disturbingly familiar. Opponents are ostracised. The leader expects total allegiance. Reporters face scrutiny. Institutions are attacked.
The president has openly expressed about his admiration for China's leader, China’s strongman leader. He has described him as a “great guy”. When they reached a brief ceasefire in the trade war on Thursday, the camaraderie between the two leaders of nations with vastly different political systems became clear. Following years of optimism in the US that closer ties with China may help the growing nation to liberalise, in the current administration, it appears that the US is being pulled in China's path, rather than the other way around.
“The United States is undergoing a period of societal upheaval,” said a constitutional law expert, a professor at a top Chinese university. “The top leader, Trump, is attempting to rally the masses in order to marginalize or undermine the elite … similar to events in the country decades past.”
Since the administration initiated the so-called Department for Government Efficiency, or the agency, on the Washington bureaucracy early on of his term, numerous Chinese observers see US politics through the lens of the Cultural Revolution. Be it the rallying of the youth to execute presidential directives, or cleansing institutions of perceived enemies, Trump as viewed from China has delivered disorder reminiscent of Mao to America, though without the same levels of violence.
But after the turmoil of the initial period under Trump subsided, an unfamiliar, different kind of political atmosphere has settled in the country, which variously also feels familiar to many Chinese individuals.
‘The Lighthouse Is Less Bright’
The most profound similarity between the US today and China is the suppression on open expression.
A former police officer, turned CCP dissenter, ended up in the eye of a storm recently, the likes of which he’d only previously experienced in China. He has lived in America since 2019, having fled China because of pressure from officials.
Last fall, following the passing of Charlie Kirk, he posted that the individual was a “scumbag”. Similar to others nationwide – many of whom were fired for making negative comments about Kirk – he encountered significant backlash. Relatives had personal info leaked and he faced allegations of being a Chinese spy seeking to divide the US.
“This incident surprised me deeply. I hadn't thought such a thing would occur in America – what should only happen in an authoritarian country,” he commented.
Deng’s backlash came from online peers, rather than the government, but that kind of public monitoring bears similarities with China.
“Regarding going after those who disagree and monitoring open discourse about issues deemed controversial … That’s starting to emerge in the US,” noted an academic, a scholar at Georgia State University. “This is that you see in the East today as well,” she added, adding that there were now fears in the US of students reporting on educators, a type of surveillance promoted by the CCP.
Zhang, the legal expert, said that liberal Chinese intellectuals such as him once turned to America for ideals, in part because openly discussing internal affairs in the country is risky. However, “The US isn't a god for Chinese liberals. America’s image has worsened across the board.”
“We used to see the US as the symbol of democratic governance, but after Trump took power, that guide appears dimmer”.
Chinese liberals, typically, at least in private, skeptical about China’s political system, are increasingly finding it less objectionable than America’s, he stated. “It’s sort of painful to accept this … but post-COVID, the government appears to be pursuing the right thing in improving the environment and developing electric cars and tech investment,” Zhang said, while “the West, as represented by the United States, seems to be declining.”
The Trump administration’s acquisition of shares in US companies has prompted parallels with China, where the distinction between government and business is frequently unclear.
On Monday, authorities announced it will take a shareholder in a startup specialising in rare earth processing, after taking comparable shares in other companies deemed essential for the country's safety. These moves have left some investors nervous that the US is entering a fresh phase of government meddling in private industry.
There are still major differences between the US under Trump and the East. In October, several news organisations including the Guardian declined to agree to a Pentagon policy that demanded reporting solely on government-authorised information. US courts have halted or overturned numerous Trump’s actions, an action that would be impossible in the nation's CCP-controlled judiciary.
Isaac Stone Fish, who established of Strategy Risks, specializing in China, said: “America might face the worst crisis of its history, far more severe than currently, and it will still be more free, more open, and liberal than China under Xi.”
Zhang observes that although many intellectuals in the country were surprised to see American colleges yield to official requests concerning diversity and inclusion practices and open discourse on university grounds, in the East, the top universities are all state-owned by default. Administrators, which are selected by the government, “have no liberty of saying no. They dare not to be disobedient.”
Nevertheless, Americans are beginning to take precautions that were once confined to repressive regimes. One professor at an American college once vocal on bilateral matters declined to be interviewed for this article. He stated: “The truth is, I fear of suppression here: I genuinely feel less afraid criticizing China's leader these days than say anything bad
