As Vickie Wang, an emerging performer, steps onto the stage in the Big Apple, she is not only thinking about what humor to deliver. Additionally, she carefully considers which topics to avoid. “I refrain from directly attacking the government,” she stated. And when she does, she ensures it isn't captured for online platforms. “I'd never publish openly material where I openly disparage the government … I think this is a learned behavior acquired back home.”
The comedian, 39, resided in the Chinese metropolis for almost a decade, departing in 2022. In 2025, she moved to the US. When she got there, she embarked on an intense period of “revenge bingeing on freedom,” attending talks, demonstrations, and delving into New York’s library system.
However in the year after Donald Trump was elected again, there has been a “palpable change” in the environment, she says. “In China, I understood where the line was, while here I'm standing on unstable ground.”
Her fears mirror a new climate in America which many Chinese, or people who have lived in China, find disturbingly similar. Enemies are ostracised. The president expects absolute loyalty. Journalists are targeted. Establishments come under fire.
The president has not been shy regarding his respect for China's leader, China’s authoritarian figure. He has described Xi as a “great guy”. When they reached a brief ceasefire in economic tensions recently, the camaraderie between both figures of nations with vastly different governance models was evident. And after decades of hope in the US that closer ties with the East could assist the growing nation become more open, in the current administration, it seems as if the US is being pulled in the Chinese direction, instead of the other way around.
“The United States is experiencing a period of societal upheaval,” stated Zhang Qianfan, a professor at Peking University. “The president, Trump, is trying to mobilise the grassroots in order to sideline or undermine established figures … similar to what happened in China decades past.”
Since Trump unleashed the so-called Department for Government Efficiency, or Doge, on federal institutions early on in office, numerous Chinese observers see American governance via the perspective of China's historical period. Be it the rallying of young people to carry out presidential directives, or purging institutions of those deemed opposition, the president as viewed from China has brought disorder reminiscent of Mao to America, though without equivalent degrees of violence.
However after the upheaval of the early months under Trump has calmed, an unfamiliar, distinct type of climate has settled in the country, which variously also feels familiar to numerous Chinese people.
‘The Lighthouse Is Less Bright’
The most profound parallel between the US today and China is the suppression on open expression.
Deng Haiyan, now a Chinese Communist party dissenter, found himself in the eye of a storm recently, similar to what he once faced in China. He resided 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 a “scumbag”. Like people across the US – who were fired as a result of making negative comments regarding him – he encountered significant backlash. Relatives had personal info leaked and he was accused of being a Chinese spy seeking to create division.
“That event was a real shock. I hadn't thought such a thing would occur in America – what should only happen in an authoritarian country,” he commented.
Deng’s pile on came from fellow social media users, instead of the state, but such of public monitoring also has similarities with China.
“In terms of going after dissenters and starting to surveil open discourse on topics that are sensitive … It's appearing in the US,” said an academic, a scholar at a US university. “That’s something observed in China today as too,” she said, adding that concerns are rising in America of pupils informing against teachers, a type of surveillance promoted by the CCP.
The professor, the legal expert, explained that liberal Chinese intellectuals like himself once turned to America for political inspiration, in part because public debate on domestic politics in the country is dangerous. But now, “America is no longer a ideal for Chinese liberals. The US's reputation has worsened across the board.”
“We used to see the US as the beacon of democratic governance, but since the new administration, that guide appears dimmer”.
Chinese liberals, typically, behind closed doors, critical of the nation's governance, now perceive it less objectionable than the US's, he stated. “It’s sort of painful to accept this … but after the pandemic, the government seems to be doing correct policies in environmental protection and developing electric cars and investing in hi-tech,” he noted, while “the West, as represented by the United States, appear in decline.”
The Trump administration’s purchase of stakes in US companies has prompted parallels with the East, where the line between government and private industry is frequently unclear.
On Monday, the US government announced 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 made some investors nervous that the US is entering a fresh phase of state intervention in the private sector.
There are still significant distinctions between Trump’s America and the East. In October, several news organisations among others refused to sign to a Pentagon policy that demanded reporting solely on government-authorised news. American judiciary have halted or reversed numerous Trump’s actions, an action that is unthinkable in China’s CCP-controlled legal system.
Isaac Stone Fish, who established of a consulting firm, a China-focused advisory firm, commented: “America could descend into the worst crisis of its history, far more severe than currently, and it would remain more free, more open, and liberal than China under Xi.”
The professor observes that although numerous scholars in the country were surprised to see US universities capitulate to government demands regarding diversity and inclusion practices and open discourse on university grounds, in the East, leading institutions are publicly controlled by default. University leaders, which are selected by the state, “have no liberty refuse. They dare not defy orders.”
Still, people in the US are beginning to take precautions previously confined to more authoritarian countries. One professor at an American college once vocal on US-China issues declined to speak for this piece. He said: “Honestly, I fear of the censorship here: I actually feel less afraid to criticise Xi now than say anything bad
