As Vickie Wang, an emerging comedic talent, takes the stage in the Big Apple, she's not just considering which jokes to deliver. She also weighs what subjects to avoid. “I don't engage in directly attacking the government,” she stated. Or if she does, she makes certain it isn't recorded for social media. “I'd never publish openly material where I openly disparage authorities … I think this is a learned behavior acquired back home.”
Wang, thirty-nine, resided in Shanghai for almost ten years, departing in 2022. By 2025, she moved to America. Upon arrival, she dove into a frenzy of “overindulging on freedom,” attending lectures, demonstrations, and delving into the city's library system.
However over the past year since Donald Trump was elected for the second time, there's been a “palpable change” in the atmosphere, she notes. “Back home, I understood where the line was, whereas here I find myself on unstable ground.”
Her fears mirror a new climate in the US which numerous individuals from China, or those with experience in the country, find disturbingly similar. Enemies face exclusion. The leader demands total allegiance. Journalists are targeted. Establishments are attacked.
Trump has openly expressed regarding his respect for China's leader, China’s authoritarian figure. He's called him as a “great guy”. When they reached a temporary truce in economic tensions on Thursday, the bonhomie between both figures of countries with vastly different governance models became clear. Following years of hope in the US that closer ties with China could assist the rising power become more open, in the current administration, it appears that the US is being pulled in the Chinese direction, rather than vice versa.
“The United States is undergoing a period of cultural revolution,” stated Zhang Qianfan, an academic at a top Chinese university. “The president, Donald Trump, is attempting to rally the grassroots in order to marginalize or weaken the elite … similar to events in China half a century ago.”
Ever since Trump unleashed what's termed a government streamlining body, or Doge, on the Washington bureaucracy at the start of his term, numerous Chinese observers see US politics via the perspective of the Cultural Revolution. Be it the mobilisation of young people to carry out presidential directives, or cleansing institutions of those deemed opposition, the president as viewed from China has delivered Mao-style chaos to the US, albeit without the same levels of force.
But since the turmoil of the initial period of the new administration has calmed, a new, distinct type of climate has emerged in the US, which in different ways also feels recognizable to many Chinese people.
‘The Lighthouse Is Less Bright’
The most profound similarity between Trump’s America and the East is the crackdown on open expression.
Deng Haiyan, now a Chinese Communist party critic, ended up in a controversy recently, the likes of which he once faced in China. He has lived in the US for several years, having fled China due to harassment from officials.
In September, after the death of a public figure, he posted that the individual was “despicable”. Similar to others across the US – who lost their jobs for making negative comments regarding him – he encountered a huge backlash. His family had personal info leaked and he faced allegations of being a Chinese spy seeking to divide the US.
“This incident was a real shock. I hadn't thought such a thing would occur in America – something that should only happen in an authoritarian country,” he commented.
His backlash originated from fellow social media users, rather than the government, but that kind of public monitoring also has similarities with China.
“Regarding targeting those who disagree and starting to surveil public speech about issues deemed controversial … That’s starting to emerge here,” noted an academic, a scholar at a US university. “That’s something that you see in the East today as well,” she added, adding that concerns are rising in the US of pupils informing against educators, a form of monitoring that has been encouraged by Chinese authorities.
The professor, the Peking University law professor, explained that progressive thinkers such as him used to look to America for political inspiration, since openly discussing internal affairs in China is dangerous. However, “The US isn't some kind of god for progressive Chinese. The US's reputation has declined across the board.”
“We once viewed America as the beacon of democratic governance, but after Trump took power, that guide appears less luminous”.
Progressive Chinese, typically, at least in private, skeptical about the nation's governance, now perceive it more acceptable than America’s, Zhang said. “It's somewhat difficult to acknowledge this reality … but after the pandemic, authorities appears to be pursuing the right thing in environmental protection and promoting EVs and tech investment,” he noted, while “Western nations, exemplified by America, appear declining.”
The Trump administration’s acquisition of stakes in US companies has prompted parallels with the East, where the distinction between government and private industry is frequently unclear.
Recently, authorities stated it will take a shareholder in a new company specialising in mineral refinement, after taking comparable shares in other companies deemed vital to the country's safety. The deals have left certain stakeholders nervous that the US is embarking on a new era of state intervention in private industry.
Yet, there remain significant distinctions between Trump’s America and the East. Last month, several news organisations among others refused to sign to a Pentagon policy that demanded they only report on government-authorised information. US courts have halted or reversed many of Trump’s actions, something that is unthinkable in China’s party-dominated legal system.
Isaac Stone Fish, the founder of Strategy Risks, a China-focused advisory firm, said: “America could descend into its gravest challenge of its history, orders of magnitudes worse than it is now, and it would remain freer, more open, and more liberal than China under Xi.”
The professor notes that while many intellectuals in China were shocked to see American colleges yield to government demands regarding DEI policies and open discourse on university grounds, in China, the top universities are publicly controlled inherently. University leaders, which are selected by the state, “have no liberty refuse. They can’t afford defy orders.”
Still, Americans are starting to take precautions that were once confined to repressive regimes. An academic at a US university who was previously vocal on bilateral matters declined to be interviewed for this piece. He stated: “The truth is, I am scared of the censorship in the US: I actually feel more comfortable to criticise Xi now than say anything bad
