When Vickie Wang, a rising performer, takes the stage in the Big Apple, she is not only thinking about what humor to deliver. Additionally, she weighs which topics to avoid. “I refrain from directly attacking the administration,” she stated. And when she ventures there, she ensures it's not captured for online platforms. “I'd never publish openly material in which I directly criticize authorities … I think it's a learned behavior from China.”
Wang, 39, lived in the Chinese metropolis for nearly ten years, leaving in 2022. In 2025, she relocated to the US. When she got there, she embarked on a frenzy of “revenge bingeing on freedom,” attending talks, demonstrations, and delving into the city's public library.
However in the year after Donald Trump returned to office again, there's been a noticeable shift in the atmosphere, she says. “Back home, I knew the boundaries, while here I find myself on unstable ground.”
Her fears reflect a new political reality in America which many Chinese, or people who have lived in the country, perceive as eerily familiar. Enemies are ostracised. The president demands total allegiance. Journalists face scrutiny. Establishments come under fire.
Trump has not been shy regarding his respect for China's leader, China’s strongman leader. He has described Xi as “fantastic”. As they agreed a brief ceasefire in economic tensions on Thursday, the bonhomie between the two leaders of nations with diametrically opposed political systems was evident. And after decades of optimism in America that closer ties with the East may help the growing nation to liberalise, in the current administration, it appears that the US is shifting in the Chinese direction, instead of the other way around.
“The United States is undergoing a period of cultural revolution,” stated a constitutional law expert, an academic at a top Chinese university. “The president, Donald Trump, is trying to mobilise the masses to marginalize or weaken 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 at the start in office, numerous Chinese observers see American governance through the lens of the Cultural Revolution. Be it the mobilisation of young people to carry out the leader’s will, or cleansing organizations of perceived enemies, Trump from a Chinese viewpoint has brought Mao-style chaos to the US, albeit without equivalent degrees of violence.
But after the turmoil of the early months of the new administration has calmed, an unfamiliar, different kind of political atmosphere has settled in the US, which variously also feels recognizable to many Chinese individuals.
‘The Lighthouse Is Dimmer’
The deepest parallel between Trump’s America and the East is the crackdown on open expression.
A former police officer, turned Chinese Communist party dissenter, ended up in a controversy recently, the likes of which he’d only previously experienced in China. He resided in America for several years, having fled the country because of pressure from officials.
In September, after the death of a public figure, Deng tweeted that Kirk was a “scumbag”. Similar to others across the US – many of whom were fired for expressing criticism about Kirk – he encountered a huge backlash. Relatives was doxed and he faced allegations of espionage attempting to create division.
“This incident was a real shock. I hadn't thought that something like this could happen in America – what should only happen in an authoritarian country,” Deng said.
Deng’s pile on originated from fellow social media users, instead of the state, but such of social surveillance bears parallels with China.
“Regarding going after those who disagree and starting to surveil open discourse on topics that are sensitive … It's appearing in the US,” noted Maria Repnikova, an associate professor at a US university. “That’s something that you see in China now as well,” she said, stating that there were now fears in America of pupils informing against educators, a form of monitoring promoted by Chinese authorities.
Zhang, the Peking University law professor, explained that progressive thinkers like himself once turned to America for political inspiration, since openly discussing internal affairs in the country is dangerous. But now, “The US isn't some kind of 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 since the new administration, this lighthouse appears less luminous”.
Chinese liberals, typically, behind closed doors, critical of China’s political system, now perceive it less objectionable than America’s, he stated. “It’s sort of painful to accept this … but after the pandemic, the government seems to be doing correct policies in improving the environment and promoting EVs and tech investment,” Zhang said, while “Western nations, exemplified by the United States, seems to be in decline.”
The Trump administration’s purchase of stakes in US companies has also drawn parallels with China, where the distinction between state and private industry is often blurred.
Recently, authorities announced it will take an investor in a new company specialising in rare earth processing, after taking similar stakes in additional firms deemed vital to the country's safety. These moves have made some investors nervous that America is embarking on a new era of government meddling in private industry.
Yet, there remain major differences between Trump’s America and the East. In October, several news organisations among others declined to agree to a Pentagon policy that required they only report on approved information. American judiciary have blocked or reversed numerous Trump’s actions, something that would be unthinkable in the nation's CCP-controlled judiciary.
An analyst, who established of a consulting firm, specializing in China, said: “The United States could descend into its gravest challenge of all time, orders of magnitudes worse than it is now, and it would remain more free, more open, and liberal than the East under its leader.”
Zhang observes that while numerous scholars in China were surprised to see American colleges yield to government demands concerning DEI policies and open discourse on university grounds, in China, the top universities are all state-owned by default. University leaders, who are appointed by the state, “have no liberty refuse. They can’t afford to be disobedient.”
Nevertheless, Americans are starting to adopt measures previously associated with repressive regimes. One professor at a US university once outspoken on US-China issues refused to speak for this piece. He stated: “Honestly, I am scared of suppression here: I genuinely feel less afraid to criticise Xi now than say anything bad
