As Vickie Wang, a rising comedic talent, steps onto the stage in the Big Apple, she is not only thinking about which jokes to tell. Additionally, she carefully considers which topics to steer clear of. “I don't engage in openly criticizing the administration,” she stated. Or if she ventures there, she ensures it's not recorded for social media. “I'd never publish openly material in which I openly disparage authorities … I think it's a habit acquired back home.”
The comedian, thirty-nine, resided in Shanghai for almost a decade, departing in that year. By 2025, she moved to America. Upon arrival, she dove into an intense period of “revenge bingeing on freedom,” attending talks, protests, and exploring the city's library system.
However in the year after Donald Trump was elected for the second time, there's been a “palpable change” in the atmosphere, she says. “In China, I knew the boundaries, while in the US I'm standing on unstable ground.”
Her concerns mirror an emerging political reality in the US which many Chinese, or people who have lived in China, perceive as eerily similar. Opponents are ostracised. The president demands absolute loyalty. Journalists are targeted. Establishments are attacked.
Trump has openly expressed regarding his respect for China's leader, the nation's authoritarian figure. He has described him as “fantastic”. When they reached a brief ceasefire in the trade war on Thursday, the bonhomie between the two leaders of nations with diametrically opposed political systems became clear. Following years of hope in America that improved relations with the East may help the growing nation to liberalise, under Trump 2.0, it seems that America is shifting in the Chinese direction, instead of the other way around.
“The United States is undergoing a period of societal upheaval,” stated a constitutional law expert, an academic at Peking University. “The top leader, Donald Trump, is attempting to rally the masses in order to sideline or undermine the elite … reminiscent of what happened in the country half a century ago.”
Ever since Trump initiated the so-called a government streamlining body, or the agency, on the Washington bureaucracy early on in office, numerous Chinese observers have viewed US politics through the lens of China's historical period. Be it the mobilisation of young people to carry out presidential directives, or purging organizations of perceived enemies, Trump from a Chinese viewpoint has brought Mao-style chaos to the US, albeit without equivalent degrees of violence.
However after the turmoil of the initial period under Trump subsided, a new, distinct type of climate has settled in the US, which variously seems recognizable to numerous Chinese people.
‘The Lighthouse Is Dimmer’
The most profound similarity between the US today and China is the crackdown on free speech.
Deng Haiyan, turned Chinese Communist party dissenter, found himself in a controversy this year, the likes of which he’d only previously experienced in China. He has lived in America since 2019, having fled the country because of pressure from the authorities.
In September, following the passing of Charlie Kirk, he posted that the individual was a “scumbag”. Similar to others across the US – who lost their jobs for making negative comments about Kirk – Deng faced a huge backlash. His family had personal info leaked and he was accused of espionage attempting to divide the US.
“That event was a real shock. I never imagined such a thing would occur in the United States – something that should only happen in an authoritarian country,” Deng said.
Deng’s pile on came from online peers, instead of the state, but such of social surveillance also has parallels with the East.
“Regarding going after those who disagree and monitoring public speech about issues that are sensitive … That’s starting to emerge here,” said an academic, an associate professor at a US university. “This is observed in China today as well,” she added, stating that there were now fears in America of students reporting on teachers, a form of monitoring that has been encouraged by the CCP.
The professor, the legal expert, explained that liberal Chinese intellectuals such as him once turned to the US for political inspiration, in part because openly discussing internal affairs in the country is dangerous. However, “The US is no longer some kind of god for Chinese liberals. America’s image has declined generally.”
“We once viewed America as the symbol of democratic governance, but after Trump took power, that guide appears dimmer”.
Progressive Chinese, who are often, at least in private, skeptical about the nation's governance, are increasingly finding it more acceptable than America’s, Zhang said. “It’s sort of painful to accept this … but post-COVID, authorities seems to be doing the right thing in improving the environment and promoting EVs and tech investment,” Zhang said, while “Western nations, as represented by the United States, appear declining.”
The government's purchase of shares in American firms has prompted parallels with China, where the distinction between state and business is frequently unclear.
On Monday, the US government stated it would become an investor in a startup focused on rare earth processing, following comparable shares in additional firms it considers essential for the country's safety. These moves have made some investors concerned that the US is embarking on a new era of government meddling in private industry.
There are still significant distinctions between the US under Trump and China. In October, several news organisations among others declined to agree to a Pentagon policy that demanded they only report on approved news. US courts have blocked or reversed many of presidential measures, an action that would be unthinkable in the nation's CCP-controlled judiciary.
An analyst, who established of Strategy Risks, a China-focused advisory firm, commented: “The United States might face 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 although numerous scholars in China were surprised to see American colleges capitulate to official requests concerning DEI policies and open discourse on campus, in the East, the top universities are publicly controlled by default. University leaders, who are appointed by the state, “have no liberty refuse. They dare not defy orders.”
Still, Americans are starting to take precautions previously confined to repressive regimes. An academic at an American college who was previously vocal on US-China issues refused to speak for this piece. He said: “Honestly, I fear of suppression here: I actually feel more comfortable to criticise Xi these days than say anything bad
