As Vickie Wang, a rising performer, takes her platform in New York, she is not just thinking about which jokes to deliver. She also carefully considers which topics to steer clear of. “I don't engage in openly attacking the administration,” she explained. And when she ventures there, she makes certain it's not recorded for online platforms. “I'd never publicly share material where I openly disparage the government … I think this is a habit from China.”
Wang, 39, lived in Shanghai for nearly ten years, leaving in that year. In 2025, she moved to America. Upon arrival, she dove into a frenzy of “revenge bingeing on freedom,” going to lectures, demonstrations, and delving into New York’s public library.
But in the year after Donald Trump was elected for the second time, there has been a noticeable shift in the atmosphere, she says. “Back home, I understood where the line was, while here I'm standing on shifting sands.”
Wang’s fears reflect a new political reality in America which many Chinese, or people with experience in China, find disturbingly familiar. Opponents are ostracised. The president demands absolute loyalty. Journalists face scrutiny. Institutions come under fire.
The president has not been shy about his admiration for Xi Jinping, China’s authoritarian figure. He has described him as a “great guy”. When they reached a temporary truce in the trade war on Thursday, the camaraderie between the two leaders of countries with vastly different political systems was evident. Following years of hope in the US that improved relations with the East may help the rising power become more open, under Trump 2.0, it appears as if America is shifting in China's path, rather than the other way around.
“The United States is experiencing a period of societal upheaval,” said a constitutional law expert, an academic at Peking University. “The top leader, Trump, is trying to rally the grassroots in order to marginalize or undermine the elite … reminiscent of what happened in China decades past.”
Ever since the administration unleashed what's termed a government streamlining body, or the agency, on federal institutions 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 the leader’s will, or purging organizations of those deemed opposition, the president as viewed from China has brought disorder reminiscent of Mao to America, though absent the same levels of violence.
But after the upheaval of the early months of the new administration has calmed, a new, distinct type of political atmosphere has emerged in the country, which in different ways seems recognizable to numerous Chinese individuals.
‘The Beacon Is Less Bright’
The most profound similarity between the US today and the East is the suppression on free speech.
Deng Haiyan, now a Chinese Communist party critic, found himself in the eye of a storm recently, the likes of which he’d only previously experienced in China. He has lived in America for several years, after escaping the country because of harassment from the authorities.
In September, after the death of Charlie Kirk, Deng tweeted that the individual was “despicable”. Similar to others across the US – who were fired for making negative comments about Kirk – Deng faced significant backlash. His family had personal info leaked and he was accused of being a Chinese spy attempting to divide the US.
“This incident was a real shock. I hadn't thought such a thing could happen in the United States – what typically happens in a repressive state,” he commented.
His pile on came from fellow social media users, rather than the government, but that kind of social surveillance also has similarities with the East.
“In terms of targeting dissenters and starting to surveil public speech about issues that are sensitive … It's appearing in the US,” said Maria Repnikova, a scholar at a US university. “This is observed in China now as too,” she added, adding that there were now fears in the US of students reporting on educators, a type of surveillance that has been encouraged by the CCP.
The professor, the Peking University law professor, said that liberal Chinese intellectuals like himself used to look to the US for ideals, since public debate on internal affairs in the country is dangerous. However, “The US is no longer some kind of ideal for progressive Chinese. The US's reputation has declined across the board.”
“We used to see the US as the beacon of constitutional democracy, but after Trump took power, that guide seems to have become less luminous”.
Progressive Chinese, typically, behind closed doors, critical of the nation's governance, are increasingly finding it less objectionable than America’s, he stated. “It’s sort of difficult to acknowledge this … but after the pandemic, the government seems to be doing correct policies in improving the environment and developing electric cars and investing in hi-tech,” Zhang said, while “the West, as represented by the United States, seems to be declining.”
The Trump administration’s purchase of shares in American firms has also drawn parallels with the East, where the distinction between state and business is often blurred.
On Monday, the US government announced it will take an investor in a new company focused on rare earth processing, following comparable shares in other companies it considers essential for national security. These moves have made certain stakeholders concerned that America is entering a new era of state intervention in private industry.
Yet, there remain 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 reporting solely on government-authorised news. American judiciary have blocked or overturned numerous presidential measures, something that would be impossible in China’s CCP-controlled legal system.
An analyst, the founder of a consulting firm, a China-focused advisory firm, said: “The United States could descend into its gravest challenge of all time, orders of magnitudes worse than it is now, and it will still be more free, more open, and more liberal than China under Xi.”
The professor notes that although many intellectuals in the country were surprised to see American colleges yield to official requests concerning DEI policies and free speech on campus, in the East, leading institutions are publicly controlled by default. Administrators, which are selected by the state, “cannot of saying no. They can’t afford defy orders.”
Still, Americans are beginning to adopt measures that were once associated with repressive regimes. An academic at a US university who was previously vocal on bilateral matters refused to be interviewed for this article. He said: “The truth is, I am scared of the censorship in the US: I genuinely feel less afraid criticizing China's leader now than say anything bad
