In every age, liberty is a fragile gift—easily dismissed, quickly squandered, and only reclaimed at great cost. The survivors of totalitarian regimes know this better than anyone. They carry scars—some physical, some spiritual—that bear witness to systems that promised equality but delivered chains, regimes that preached justice while silencing truth, movements that cried out for progress while slaughtering history, tradition, and the soul of a people.
Today, a growing chorus of voices from Cuba, Venezuela, the Soviet Union, China, North Korea, Romania, Nicaragua, Cambodia, Lithuania and other authoritarian-ruled lands are sounding the alarm. These are not political pundits or cultural critics—they are survivors. Men and women who fled Marxist revolutions, collectivist purges, and one-party dictatorships. Many came to the United States and other Western countries like the UK with little more than the clothes on their backs and the belief that America offered the one thing their homeland could no longer provide: freedom.
Now, they are watching in disbelief as America embraces many of the same ideas, attitudes, and institutions that drove their countries into poverty, persecution, and totalitarian collapse under the Biden administration. They speak to warn us—not from theory or partisanship, but from the deep reservoir of experience. They see the rhetoric of class warfare and identity politics, the suppression of dissent, the weaponization of media and education, and the rising expectation that citizens conform to the ideology of the day or be punished.
What makes these warnings all the more haunting is that many Americans and Westerners, particularly younger generations, have never seen true tyranny. They assume that because we have iPhones and elections, we are immune to history’s darker turns. But tyranny rarely announces itself with fanfare. It begins softly—through language, through institutions, through ideology disguised as compassion.
The danger is not merely governmental overreach. The greater danger is cultural rot—a people who forget what freedom is, who can no longer articulate its value, and who exchange ordered liberty for engineered equity. These emigrants have seen this erosion before. They lived under regimes that promised utopia but required the obliteration of truth to achieve it.
This essay exists to amplify their voices. It is a chorus of witnesses—Daniel DiMartino from Venezuela, Xi Van Fleet from China, Yeonmi Park from North Korea, and others—who plead with Americans to recognize the signs. They do not all speak with the same vocabulary. Some emphasize economics, others culture, others spirituality. But they all say the same thing in essence:
“We fled what you are now flirting with.”
18 different emigrants from leftist authoritarian states
The structure of this post is simple but sobering. First, we will present these personal testimonies, allowing each survivor to describe their experience under socialist and authoritarian regimes and what they now see in America that alarms them. Next, we will compile the common traits and tactics of totalitarianism that they recognize in the American and Western context. Finally, we will close with a warning: that ignoring these voices is not just naive—it is dangerous. For history is clear: nations that embrace ideology over liberty, conformity over conscience, and revolution over repentance do not end in renewal—they end in ruin.
As Christians, conservatives, and lovers of truth and freedom, we are called to be discerning. Scripture warns us not to be “tossed to and fro by every wind of doctrine” (Eph. 4:14), nor to be deceived by “smooth words and flattering speech” (Rom. 16:18). The survivors quoted in this essay have no smooth words. Their stories are not flattering. They are uncomfortable, raw, and sometimes difficult to believe. But they are true.
This is our moment to listen.
Our Testimonies
Daniel DiMartino – Venezuela
Daniel DiMartino grew up in Caracas under the regime of Hugo Chávez. Born into a middle-class family, Daniel’s early life was relatively stable—until the full weight of socialist policies began to crush the Venezuelan economy. “We had everything we needed until the government decided that it knew better than we did,” Daniel recounts. In his teenage years, he witnessed the slow-motion implosion of an entire society: price controls that gutted grocery stores, nationalizations that drove out businesses, and currency devaluations that vaporized family savings. His family waited in line for hours for basic goods. Once, he tells of needing a bar of soap and waiting half a day—only to discover it had run out. What shocked him most was how long people remained hopeful, believing that if they just elected the “right” socialist, things would improve. “We didn’t realize we had already lost our freedom until it was too late,” he explains.
When Daniel came to America and began speaking at universities, he was stunned to hear American students praising socialism and Bernie Sanders. “I couldn’t believe it. They spoke about socialism like it was just kindness, equality, and fairness. That’s not what it is. It’s control. It’s corruption. It’s the destruction of your choices and your future.” Today, he runs the Dissident Project to bring the voices of socialist survivors to U.S. classrooms. He sees ominous signs: media manipulation, government spending with no accountability, and a growing culture of dependency. “Venezuela didn’t collapse because we ran out of resources. We collapsed because people traded freedom for comfort, and eventually got neither.”
Xi Van Fleet – China (Cultural Revolution Survivor)
Xi Van Fleet was a young girl during Mao Zedong’s Cultural Revolution, a decade-long campaign to uproot traditional Chinese culture and impose absolute ideological conformity. “I was only six years old when it began, but even children were not exempt from the fear,” she says. Her teachers denounced their fellow educators; children were expected to shame their parents; churches were desecrated, and temples destroyed. Books were burned, and art redefined through a political lens. She remembers classmates turning against one another for failing to recite the right slogans or for not clapping enthusiastically enough during state celebrations. “We were taught to hate the past, to hate our heritage, to hate religion—and to worship Mao.”
After coming to America and living in Virginia, Xi was horrified to see Critical Race Theory entering public schools. “This is not about race. It’s about revolution,” she warns. “This is Maoism, the same tactics with new names.” She likens the call for anti-racist reeducation, the demonization of American history, and the erasure of traditional values to the playbook of the Red Guards. “What began in China as equality quickly became tyranny,” she says. “We were told we were building a better world, but what we built was a prison of the mind.” Her testimony is a clarion call for vigilance in education and culture.
Franklin Camargo – Venezuela
Franklin Camargo was born into a nation that once welcomed immigrants and thrived on innovation and enterprise. But by the time he entered adulthood, his homeland had transformed into a place of surveillance, paranoia, and collapse. Camargo worked as a journalist and witnessed firsthand how media freedoms vanished under socialist rule. “I used to think I was living in a country with a future,” he recalls. “But we traded reality for propaganda.” He recounts how dissenting journalists were blacklisted, imprisoned, or “disappeared.” Government-controlled outlets parroted the regime’s narrative while social media was restricted or censored. “We were told what to think, what to feel, and what to say.”
Since coming to America, Franklin has seen worrying signs. “It’s happening here,” he says without hesitation. “Independent journalists silenced. People banned from platforms for wrongthink. News agencies all repeating the same politically correct slogans.” He warns that the moral language of the Left—talk of equity, inclusion, and safety—can be used as a cover for soft tyranny. “That’s how it started in Venezuela. We were told we were building a compassionate society. But soon compassion meant punishing success, criminalizing dissent, and rewriting truth.” Camargo now speaks with conservative groups across the U.S. to remind people that freedom of speech and press are fragile, and once surrendered, are rarely returned.
Jorge Galicia – Venezuela
Jorge Galicia was once a hopeful law student in Venezuela, growing up in what he called “the most prosperous country in Latin America.” In his youth, Venezuela still had thriving cities, booming oil exports, and a relatively free society. But as Jorge matured, so did the socialist revolution ushered in by Hugo Chávez. He recalls how slogans of social justice, equity, and wealth redistribution slowly became mandates backed by authoritarian force. His university classes turned into political indoctrination sessions. Professors delivered lectures praising Marx and condemning capitalism. “I started seeing friends disappear into government programs or street protests that didn’t come back,” he says. “Free speech vanished, one word at a time.”
Galicia eventually fled to the United States, where he now speaks on college campuses with Young America’s Foundation. To his alarm, he sees echoes of Venezuela’s ideological slide. “The language is eerily familiar—talk of equity over equality, systemic oppression, dismantling institutions,” he says. “It’s exactly what we heard in Caracas in 2005.” He warns that socialism rarely arrives through revolution but rather through culture, media, and education. Galicia has seen activists in U.S. universities glorifying Chávez, even as his family still struggles to access electricity and clean water in Venezuela. “We traded our liberty for the promise of justice. We got neither.”
Axel Kaiser – Chile
Axel Kaiser grew up in Santiago, Chile, during the decades following the free-market reforms of the late 20th century—an era that transformed Chile into one of Latin America’s most prosperous and stable nations. As a young law student, he lived in a society that was far from perfect, but one where free enterprise had lifted millions out of poverty and created unprecedented opportunity. However, Kaiser soon began to notice a dangerous shift in the cultural winds.
What disturbed him wasn’t just political rhetoric—it was the intellectual decay that spread through Chile’s universities and media. “We were importing the worst ideas from Europe and America,” he says, “namely postmodernism, identity politics, and Marxist social theory dressed up in academic language.” His legal education was increasingly filled with critiques of capitalism, condemnations of the West, and calls to dismantle Chile’s liberal constitution. The country that had become a model for economic freedom was now flirting with the very ideologies that had once crippled the region.
Kaiser would go on to study in Germany, earn a doctorate in philosophy, and become a fierce advocate for liberty across Latin America. He returned not to retreat from the battlefield but to confront it head-on—founding think tanks like the Fundación para el Progreso and authoring books such as The Tyranny of Equality and The Populist Deception. In them, he argues that envy disguised as justice is the surest path to authoritarianism. “You can’t have equality of outcomes without coercion,” he warns. “And when coercion becomes the method, freedom is always the casualty.”
Now based partly in the United States and Europe, Kaiser speaks globally about the cultural and political trends unraveling the West from within. What troubles him most is not the presence of socialism in Latin America—it’s the willingness of Western elites to embrace it under new names: equity, social justice, anti-racism, climate redistribution. “These are not new ideas,” he says. “They are the same totalitarian impulses repackaged for modern sensibilities.”
He sees America’s universities descending into the same ideological trap that snared Chile—a rejection of merit, the vilification of Western civilization, and the rise of identity-based collectivism. “I’ve seen this movie before,” Kaiser says. “It starts with guilt and ends with gulags.”
To the young, he offers a sober warning: “Don’t sell your birthright of liberty for the illusion of safety or fairness. The people promising utopia always forget to mention the secret police.”
Lukas Degutis – Lithuania (Post-Soviet Survivor and Journalist)
Lukas Degutis was born in Lithuania shortly after the collapse of the Soviet Union, yet the legacy of totalitarianism hung heavily over his childhood. Though technically free, the nation remained haunted by decades of occupation and ideological manipulation. His father, like many Lithuanians, had been raised under the watchful eye of the Soviet state—taught to revere the Communist Party and regard Stalin as a kind of god. “He told me how they were expected to bow their heads when Stalin’s name was mentioned in class,” Lukas recalls. “It was a worship without faith—a submission without soul.” Even as the Iron Curtain fell, the mentality of blind allegiance and central planning remained entrenched in many minds and institutions.
Degutis eventually studied in the United Kingdom, where he was startled to find that many students and professors viewed socialism not as a danger, but as a virtue. “I was surrounded by people who had never lived under tyranny, yet were eager to defend it—calling it ‘fairness’ or ‘equality,’” he said. Working as a journalist with The Spectator, he warns that Westerners are blind to the slow creep of authoritarian thought in their media, government, and universities. “When you’re taught to hate your country, erase your history, and shame your faith—you’re not being enlightened. You’re being prepared for control,” he says. Degutis’s father once feared the state’s wrath if he expressed love for freedom. Now, Lukas fears Westerners will surrender that freedom willingly, all in the name of safety, tolerance, or progress.
Yeonmi Park – North Korea
Yeonmi Park’s story is among the most gripping of all. Born in North Korea, she was taught from childhood to idolize the Kim regime as gods. Her textbooks glorified state murder. Her family whispered their conversations at home for fear that even a child might accidentally report them. “I believed Kim Jong-il could read my thoughts,” she confesses. Hunger, terror, and propaganda were constants. She witnessed public executions, survived sexual assault, escaped via human traffickers into China, and ultimately fled to the West. Her journey to freedom was long and traumatic, but in America, she hoped she had finally found safety and sanity.
Yet Yeonmi has become one of the most outspoken critics of American universities. After attending Columbia University, she described the culture as “madness.” Professors mocked the West, praised Marx, and insisted that feelings matter more than facts. “They told me that asking questions about gender was oppressive,” she says. “It reminded me of North Korea—only with fancier words.” She was shocked to see students terrified to speak freely and professors fired for saying the “wrong” thing. “They call it ‘wokeness,’” she says. “But it’s just another form of totalitarian control.” Yeonmi warns that when freedom of thought dies, freedom itself is not far behind. Her voice, forged in one of the world’s darkest regimes, pleads with Americans to defend the liberties they take for granted.
Jennifer Zeng – China (Labor Camp Survivor and Falun Gong Practitioner)
Jennifer Zeng was a successful Chinese woman living a quiet life until she embraced Falun Gong, a peaceful spiritual practice emphasizing truthfulness, compassion, and forbearance. In 1999, the Chinese Communist Party declared Falun Gong a threat to the regime, and Jennifer’s life turned into a nightmare. She was arrested and sent to a labor camp without trial. “They tried to brainwash me to abandon my faith. We were forced to read Communist literature for hours on end, to chant slogans, to watch propaganda films, and to report on each other,” she recalls. She suffered beatings, electric shocks, forced labor, and psychological torment. “What shocked me most was how people were trained to monitor and police each other, even in their private thoughts.”
Now living in the West, Jennifer sees disturbing similarities between Chinese propaganda and the American media. “The uniformity of thought, the demonization of dissent, and the blind faith in government solutions—it’s the same mechanism,” she warns. She is especially concerned about digital censorship and cancel culture. “When you can’t question authority, you’re not free,” she says plainly. Her testimony is both a survival story and a cautionary tale for Americans who mistake liberty for license and tolerance for enforced silence.
Gabby Franco – Venezuela
Gabby Franco was once a proud member of the Venezuelan Olympic shooting team, representing her country in international competitions. Her journey began in a nation that had potential, promise, and a rich heritage. But under Chávez and later Maduro, Venezuela’s transformation into a socialist state turned her dream into a nightmare. She recalls how once-respected athletes, businesspeople, and academics were suddenly viewed as enemies of the revolution. “There was a growing hatred for success—people who had worked hard were demonized as greedy capitalists,” she says. Over time, merit was replaced by loyalty to the regime. Even Olympic athletes had to show fealty to socialist ideals.
After emigrating to the U.S., Gabby was shocked to find familiar rhetoric in places she least expected it. She observed political candidates calling for gun bans, government-run healthcare, and social engineering. “I left a country where only criminals and the military have guns. It didn’t make anyone safer—it made us vulnerable to the state,” she insists. Franco is now an outspoken supporter of the Second Amendment and often reminds Americans that disarmament is a necessary step in every socialist takeover. “They always start by saying they just want safety. Then they take your rights, your dignity, and your ability to resist.” She speaks at events and through her platform to warn that no nation is immune to tyranny—not even America.
Andy Ionescu – Romania under Nicolae Ceaușescu
Andy Ionescu grew up in the shadow of one of Eastern Europe’s most brutal regimes. Under the iron-fisted rule of Nicolae Ceaușescu, Romania endured pervasive state control, psychological manipulation, and institutionalized fear. “The government controlled everything: food, work, religion, education, and even your relationships,” Andy recalls. “You were expected to love the Party more than your family.” He recounts walking past enormous portraits of Ceaușescu every day, the state-sponsored propaganda promising utopia while the people stood in line for bread and medicine. Teachers were agents of indoctrination. Children were expected to report their parents. Neighbors spied on neighbors, and the church was infiltrated by state security forces. “It wasn’t just oppression,” Andy emphasizes, “it was engineered self-censorship. You stopped speaking freely, even to yourself.”
After fleeing Romania and eventually making it to the United States, Ionescu was relieved to find a free society—but disturbed by recent developments. “When I hear college professors pushing collectivist ideals, when I see the state interfering in churches during COVID, when I read that certain speech is being labeled ‘violence’—I feel I’ve seen this movie before,” he warns. He’s particularly alarmed by the growing expectation of ideological conformity. “In Romania, if you questioned the regime, you lost your job—or worse. In America, you may not be arrested, but you’ll be fired, banned, or ‘canceled.’ It’s the same spirit: control dressed up as compassion.” Ionescu now works with churches and civic groups to promote vigilance against tyranny in its softest, most seductive form.
Louie Iglesias & Ray Armas – Cuba
Louie Iglesias and Ray Armas are Cuban-American refugees who each carry memories of revolution, betrayal, and repression. Louie was a child during the early years of Fidel Castro’s regime, which rose to power on promises of justice and equality. “At first, the slogans sounded noble,” Louie remembers. “But then the guns came out, the property was seized, and people began to vanish.” Louie’s family lost their small business and were labeled “counter-revolutionaries” for attending church. “My uncle was arrested for saying the wrong thing in a bar. Just a few words, and he disappeared.” Schools were transformed into Marxist indoctrination centers. Ray, whose father was a political prisoner, recounts how even music and art were repurposed for propaganda. “You were surrounded by the Revolution 24/7. There was no escape—not at home, not in church, not even in your thoughts.”
Having resettled in Florida, both men became involved in anti-socialist activism. They are dismayed by the romanticizing of socialism among America’s youth. “I hear kids talking about how Cuba has great healthcare and education,” Ray says. “They have no idea what it costs to live in that ‘free’ system.” Louie adds, “What we’re seeing here now—the censorship, the glorification of the state, the demonization of religion and family—is exactly how it began in Cuba.” Both men believe that cultural rot precedes political collapse. “They told us to give up freedom for fairness. But fairness never came. Only fear.” Today, they speak in schools and churches, hoping their stories can prevent another generation from being seduced by utopian lies.
Olga Voloshina – Soviet Union
Olga Voloshina was born in the USSR during the Cold War, when Soviet communism was at its height. Her childhood was shaped by rigid ideological boundaries, constant surveillance, and a state-run media apparatus that served as the voice of the Party. “We didn’t believe the news,” she recalls. “It was pure fiction, designed to make the regime look benevolent and the West look evil.” Olga’s family endured poverty, despite the state’s promises of equality. Bread lines were normal. Speaking your mind was not. Her father, a man of quiet Christian faith, was monitored by the KGB. “Religion was ridiculed. You had to whisper your prayers,” she explains. “At school, they taught us that belief in God was backward and dangerous.”
When Olga immigrated to America, she felt she had escaped a nightmare. But over time, she began to see familiar signs. “When I see major corporations, universities, and media outlets all repeating the same slogans—‘diversity, equity, inclusion’—I get chills,” she says. “We had our own slogans in the USSR. They sounded virtuous too.” She’s alarmed by what she calls “soft totalitarianism”—the emergence of cultural conformity enforced not by secret police, but by social media mobs, HR departments, and activist bureaucracies. “In the USSR, we feared the state. In America, you’re beginning to fear each other.” Olga now speaks with immigrant advocacy groups and churches to defend liberty and encourage Americans to resist ideological conformity. “Freedom must be practiced or it will be lost,” she warns.
Seak Smith – Cambodia (Khmer Rouge Survivor)
Seak Smith was just a young girl when the Khmer Rouge, under Pol Pot, seized power in Cambodia in 1975. Within days, the regime emptied the cities and forced millions into agricultural labor camps. “We lost everything overnight—our home, our clothes, even our names,” she recalls. Her father, an educated man, was executed because intellectuals were considered enemies of the people. “They said we had to destroy the old society to build a new one,” she explains. “They made us hate our past, our culture, our families.” In the labor camps, Seak endured starvation, disease, and relentless ideological indoctrination. “We were told that loyalty to the collective mattered more than love for your own mother.” Nearly two million Cambodians—about a quarter of the population—died in the genocide.
Having resettled in the United States years later, Seak tried to leave the horrors behind her. But as she saw American culture turn toward revolutionary rhetoric, historical revisionism, and identity politics, painful memories resurfaced. “When I see people tearing down statues and saying America is evil and must be remade—I’ve heard that before. That’s what the Khmer Rouge said about Cambodia.” She sees worrying signs in the erosion of free speech and the growing power of ideological mobs. “We were told what to say, what to believe, how to live—and we obeyed out of fear. Don’t let that happen here.” Seak now shares her story publicly, urging Americans to resist any ideology that demands absolute loyalty to a cause over family, faith, and freedom.
Zoltan Zsohar – Hungary (Soviet-Controlled Eastern Bloc)
Zoltan Zsohar was born in communist Hungary, one of several nations swallowed into the Soviet sphere after World War II. His earliest memories include the 1956 Hungarian Revolution, when citizens rose up to reclaim their freedom, only to be crushed by Soviet tanks. “We had a brief glimpse of hope,” he says, “but the communists came back with a vengeance.” The years that followed were filled with political repression, economic stagnation, and the suffocating bureaucracy of Marxist central planning. “We lived in fear of informants. The government told us what to study, what to think, and what kind of work to do,” Zsohar remembers. Dissent meant imprisonment—or worse. Even churches were co-opted or shuttered.
After escaping to the West, Zsohar settled in the United States, grateful for its liberty. But decades later, he is troubled. “I never thought I would see similar patterns in America—the stifling of unpopular opinions, the rewriting of history, the glorification of revolution.” He’s particularly disturbed by the younger generation’s flirtation with socialism and their trust in state solutions for every problem. “It always begins with the promise of equality,” he says. “But it ends with everyone equally miserable, except the ones in charge.” Zoltan warns Americans not to be fooled by the rhetoric of fairness and justice when it comes from ideologues who despise the Constitution and mock faith and tradition. “They call it progress. I call it the path to slavery.”
Gloria Álvarez – Guatemala (Libertarian Commentator Against Latin Socialism)
Though not a refugee from a full-blown Marxist state, Gloria Álvarez has spent her life resisting the steady spread of socialist ideology throughout Latin America. Born in Guatemala, she watched her country teeter between corruption, authoritarian populism, and revolutionary socialism. As a student of political science and international development, Álvarez saw a pattern emerge across countries like Venezuela, Bolivia, Nicaragua, and Cuba: economic collapse, rising statism, identity politics, and a cynical manipulation of the poor. “They always promise dignity and justice,” she says. “But they never deliver. Instead, they buy votes, silence critics, and destroy the rule of law.”
Álvarez has warned repeatedly that American youth are being deceived by the polished version of socialism promoted by academia, Hollywood, and the media. “They don’t teach you about the starvation, the police states, or the exiles. They teach you about ‘equity’ and ‘redistribution.’” She especially criticizes identity-based Marxism, which she sees as a repackaging of class warfare. “It’s not about lifting people up—it’s about tearing everyone down so the state can rule.” Gloria’s book The Populist Deception details how emotional narratives are used to seize power under the guise of compassion. She implores Americans to defend their Constitution, their economic freedom, and their institutions. “Liberty is rare,” she warns. “You either protect it or you lose it forever.”
Miguel Mendoza – Nicaragua (Journalist and Political Prisoner)
Miguel Mendoza was one of Nicaragua’s most outspoken independent journalists before being arrested in 2021 by the regime of Daniel Ortega. Mendoza criticized Ortega’s corruption and election fraud on social media—an act that led to his imprisonment without trial. “They didn’t even accuse me of a real crime,” he said after his release. “Just being a journalist who questioned the state was enough.” Mendoza was locked up with dozens of other political prisoners, many of whom were tortured, starved, or isolated. He lost over 60 pounds in captivity and suffered psychological abuse. “We lived in a place where the truth could get you killed,” he said in a Washington Post interview.
Now living in exile, Mendoza sees ominous signs in the United States—where journalists are demonized, dissent is framed as misinformation, and ideological purity is demanded in newsrooms. “I see the same tactics: smear campaigns, canceling, twisting language,” he says. “In Nicaragua, they said we were ‘threats to democracy’—the same words I hear some Americans using to silence their opponents.” He’s alarmed by the politicization of the press and the eroding trust in objective reporting. “When all media tells the same story, you don’t have journalism. You have propaganda.” Mendoza’s voice is a grim reminder that tyranny often starts with the words people are no longer allowed to say.
Maximo Alvarez – Cuba
Maximo Alvarez may be one of the most eloquent defenders of liberty among Cuban exiles. At the 2020 Republican National Convention, his speech went viral as he described fleeing Castro’s Cuba with nothing but the clothes on his back. “I’ve seen ideas like this before,” he said. “I’ve seen people like this before. I’ve seen movements like this before. And I’m here to tell you—we cannot let them take this country the way they took mine.” Alvarez was a child when the revolution began. His father, understanding the ideological shift underway, sent him to the U.S. under Operation Pedro Pan. “My father knew that if we lost America, there would be nowhere left to go.”
Alvarez now runs a successful business and often speaks to civic groups and conservative organizations. His deepest fear is that Americans don’t recognize the danger of soft socialism. “It doesn’t come with guns and uniforms at first,” he explains. “It comes with free promises. Free college. Free healthcare. Free this, free that. But there’s always a price—and that price is your soul.” He draws direct parallels between the demonization of the wealthy, the erosion of religious liberty, and the cultural self-hatred sweeping parts of American society. “This country gave me everything,” he says. “And I won’t stay silent while people try to destroy it from within.” His voice is rich with the moral urgency of someone who knows what comes after the slogans are no longer just words.
Common Characteristics They Observe in the USA
Across continents, cultures, and languages, the men and women featured in this essay—survivors of China’s Cultural Revolution, Soviet totalitarianism, Venezuelan socialism, Castro’s Cuba, and the Khmer Rouge genocide—have recognized familiar signs re-emerging in the land they fled to for refuge: the United States of America.
Despite coming from varied backgrounds and witnessing different expressions of leftist authoritarianism, their testimonies converge around a core set of common characteristics now manifesting in U.S. politics, media, education, and cultural life.
Below is a thematic compilation of these patterns—drawn from their words and warnings.
The Rise of Propaganda and Narrative Control
In every regime these emigrants fled, the centralization of media and the control of public discourse were the first steps toward totalitarian rule. Today, they see the same tendency forming in the U.S.—not through overt state control, but through ideological hegemony across corporate media, academia, and tech platforms.
- Olga Voloshina (USSR) noted how Soviet state media created alternate realities. In the U.S., she sees a similar effect: news outlets repeat the same narratives, suppress dissenting voices, and label any deviation as “disinformation.”
- Miguel Mendoza (Nicaragua) pointed out how terms like “threat to democracy” are weaponized to discredit legitimate opposition.
- Yeonmi Park (North Korea) was appalled to see professors and journalists in the U.S. promoting the same Marxist slogans she had to memorize under the Kim regime.
While American media remains technically independent, ideological groupthink and activist journalism often produce propaganda-like uniformity. “Freedom of the press,” warned Mendoza, “means nothing if everyone is saying the same thing.”
The Erosion of Free Speech and Growing Censorship
A deeply unsettling observation repeated by nearly all of these witnesses is the slow collapse of free expression in the United States.
- Jennifer Zeng (China) was shocked to see digital censorship on American platforms resembling the CCP’s tactics. “We were told what to say in China. Here, you’re told what not to say.”
- Daniel DiMartino, Jorge Galicia, and Gabby Franco (Venezuela) warned that freedom to speak was lost long before full authoritarianism arrived. It begins with ridicule, then ostracism, then legal threats.
- Seak Smith (Cambodia) emphasized that fear of offending others is a gateway to fearing the regime itself. “When people stop speaking truth because they fear social punishment, tyranny is already winning.”
- Xi Van Fleet tied it directly to Maoism: “In China, we called it ‘thought reform.’ In America, they call it ‘sensitivity training.’ It’s the same thing.”
Censorship has not arrived in jackboots, but via corporate policy, social pressure, and ideological enforcement by institutions that once upheld liberty.
Indoctrination in Education and the Politicization of Children
Perhaps the most alarming and consistent theme was how education is being used to shape ideology rather than transmit truth.
- Xi Van Fleet, a survivor of the Cultural Revolution, said the rewriting of American history in public schools mirrors the tactics of Mao’s Red Guards. “We were told to hate our ancestors, our country, and even our parents. That’s what I see happening now.”
- Andy Ionescu (Romania) recalled how schools turned children into informants and citizens into ideological puppets.
- Gabby Franco (Venezuela) warned that today’s U.S. educational system is teaching students to resent their country, just as Chavista education destroyed civic identity in Venezuela.
- Yeonmi Park expressed horror at how American universities stifle inquiry and replace critical thinking with emotional orthodoxy.
The pattern is unmistakable: begin with youth. If a generation can be taught to hate their past, their culture, and their faith, they can be made to accept anything in the name of progress.
Identity Politics and Division Through Group Conflict
Another common theme was the deliberate use of identity categories—race, gender, class—to divide society and erode unity.
- Gloria Álvarez and Daniel DiMartino warned that identity-based Marxism is simply a repackaged form of class struggle: “Instead of rich vs. poor, it’s oppressed vs. oppressor. Same poison. Different label.”
- Zoltan Zsohar (Hungary) remembered how class warfare rhetoric justified everything from land seizures to imprisonment. “When the state divides you into ‘bad’ and ‘good’ groups, it is always to control both.”
- Maximo Alvarez added that envy is a powerful tool of tyrants: “They turned us against each other in Cuba—workers against farmers, poor against rich, young against old.”
America’s embrace of grievance politics, cancel culture, and intersectional ideology reminds these survivors of the calculated destruction of social cohesion in their homelands.
Expansion of the State and the Culture of Dependency
Several emigrants warned that socialism often enters not through revolution but through welfare promises and growing dependency on the state.
- Daniel DiMartino, whose middle-class family was impoverished by Venezuela’s welfare state, saw how citizens traded liberty for subsidies and were then enslaved by them.
- Gabby Franco emphasized that socialist policies always begin with “free” education, healthcare, and housing—before crushing any opposition to state control.
- Louie Iglesias and Ray Armas (Cuba) remembered how the state first gave, then took, then punished. “The more you depend on government, the less freedom you keep.”
These emigrants warn that economic centralization breeds both inefficiency and tyranny—and that state power is never benevolent when unchecked.
Demonization of Faith, Family, and Tradition
A striking number of survivors highlighted how religious faith, strong family bonds, and national heritage were targeted early by the regimes they fled.
- Jennifer Zeng’s faith in Falun Gong made her a target for imprisonment and torture in China. She sees anti-religious sentiment rising in the U.S. under the guise of tolerance.
- Olga Voloshina (Soviet Union) and Andy Ionescu (Romania) recalled how churches were infiltrated and mocked; today they see American churches marginalized and forced to conform to secular moral frameworks.
- Maximo Alvarez mourned the cultural decay in America. “You don’t build strong nations by destroying the family. That’s what communists always do.”
These testimonies warn that societies which abandon transcendent truth, undermine the family, and erase tradition invite political control to fill the void.
The Loss of Rule of Law and Judicial Neutrality
Several witnesses drew attention to how the law is increasingly politicized in the U.S.—a critical turning point in any country’s descent into tyranny.
- Miguel Mendoza (Nicaragua) noted that in Latin America, once political bias infects the judiciary, it is nearly impossible to undo.
- Zoltan Zsohar warned that when courts are used as weapons and political opponents are prosecuted selectively, the damage to liberty is lasting and structural.
- Jorge Galicia saw this in Venezuela’s transition, where legal institutions were slowly co-opted until elections became irrelevant.
The separation of powers, blind justice, and equal application of law are essential to liberty—and the erosion of those principles is not theoretical for these survivors.
Surveillance, Deplatforming, and Fear of Expression
From North Korea to East Germany, totalitarian regimes are sustained by mutual suspicion and technological monitoring.
- Yeonmi Park grew up believing her thoughts were being watched—an experience she sees echoed in America’s “surveillance capitalism” and cancel culture.
- Jennifer Zeng sees digital blacklists in the U.S. as the seed of China’s social credit system.
- Franklin Camargo warned that if tech companies collude with the state to track speech and behavior, liberty disappears silently.
These emigrants are not conspiracy theorists. They have lived the dystopia—and they see the scaffolding of it in the West today.
Summary Table of Concerns
| Theme | Key Testimonies | Common Thread |
|---|---|---|
| Propaganda/Narrative Control | Voloshina, Mendoza, Park | Unified messaging, suppression of dissent |
| Censorship | Zeng, DiMartino, Camargo | Silencing via fear and policy |
| Education/Indoctrination | Van Fleet, Ionescu, Franco | Youth used as ideological tools |
| Identity Marxism | Álvarez, Zsohar, Alvarez | Division through envy and resentment |
| Welfare Dependency | DiMartino, Franco, Iglesias | “Free” goods used to enslave citizens |
| Anti-Faith/Tradition | Zeng, Voloshina, Alvarez | Destruction of moral and spiritual foundation |
| Legal Weaponization | Mendoza, Galicia, Zsohar | Law used to punish political enemies |
| Surveillance/Control | Park, Zeng, Camargo | Tech-enabled tyranny, digital blacklists |
Conclusion — “The Watchman’s Cry”
If the warnings in this essay feel heavy, it is because they are. The stakes are high—not just for elections or economics, but for the soul of a nation that once stood as a beacon of ordered liberty, religious freedom, and constitutional restraint.
The witnesses you have heard are not strangers to suffering. They know what it’s like to watch their nations unravel in the name of progress. They’ve seen constitutions shredded, faith criminalized, and families destroyed—all in pursuit of a utopia that never came. They now live in a country that once promised escape from such systems. But what disturbs them most is the growing sense that America no longer sees the danger.
And yet, millions of Americans ignore these voices—either out of indifference, willful ignorance, or ideological commitment to the very systems these survivors escaped. But history is not kind to those who silence their prophets. The voices in this essay are like the watchmen described in Ezekiel 33. They see the sword coming. They cry out. Their hands are clean.
The prophet Ezekiel warned the nation of Israel about impending disaster, but they failed to listen. Our nation is facing similar disaster.
But if the watchman sees the sword coming and does not blow the trumpet….his blood I will require at the watchman’s hand.
Ezekiel 33:6
We cannot claim we weren’t warned. These refugees have risked their reputations, their safety, and in some cases their new lives in America to speak the truth. We owe them our ears—and more than that, our response.
What can we do?
- Educate the next generation in truth, not ideology. Recover the classical virtues and the biblical worldview that once shaped our institutions.
- Defend free speech—everywhere, especially where it is unpopular. Refuse to be silenced.
- Expose the lies of socialism, critical theory, and identity Marxism. Do so boldly, with clarity and charity.
- Uphold the family, the church, and local governance. These are the bulwarks against statism.
- Pray for revival in both the church and the nation. Cultural reformation must be accompanied by spiritual awakening.
- Vote against the Democrat party. They have proven that they are not worthy of our trust and are aligned with leftist totalitarianism. They are more than willing to use violence to ensure political domination.
To ignore the voices of those who survived socialism is to invite its return—this time not by invasion, but by imitation.
Let the reader take warning: those who escaped the burning house are telling us that they smell smoke.
We would be fools not to listen.
S.D.G.,
Robert Sparkman
christiannewsjunkie@gmail.com
P.S. I will be adding testimonies from the aforementioned individuals over time. Many of them have interviews on Youtube. Search for their interviews and watch them as you have opportunity. I have placed the most compelling individuals at the top of my list above. RLS.
RELATED CONTENT
Daniel DiMartino of Venezuela provides his testimony related to the Neo-Marxist takeover of his home country which he sees as similar to the Democrat-championed Progressives and their movement. Daniel DiMartino has several videos on Youtube explaining the Venezuelan situation.
Axel Kaiser of Chile provides his testimony related to the Marxist takeover of his home country and the similarities he sees in the USA by the Progressives championed by the Democrat Party.
Xi Van Fleet of China discusses the Marxist takeover of her home country and the similarities she sees in contemporary America and the Progressives (woke, Cultural Marxists) championed by the Democrat Party.
Franklin Camargo of Venezuela discusses his decision to leave his home country following their Marxist revolution.
Jorge Galicia of Venzuela provides his testimony regarding leaving Venezuela due to the Neo-Marxist regime.
Axel Kaiser of Chile discusses the destruction of his country by the leftist revolution.
Lukas DeGutis of Lithuania, an emigrant to the United Kingdom, discusses his upbringing and the influence of Marxist-Leninism in the former Soviet Union.
Yeonmi Park of North Korea provides her testimony to young Americans concerning the dangerous direction our nation is taking.
Jennifer Zeng of China recounts her experience as a prisoner in a communist Chinese labor camp due to her religious beliefs. She is a practitioner of the Falon Gong faith. The Chinese Communist Party persecutes this religious group heavily.
Gabby Franco discusses her emigration from Hugo Chavez’ Venezuela. She was formerly an Olympic shooter representing Venezuela.
Andy Ionescu describes communism in Romania. He describes the similarity between leftism in America and communism in Romania.
Concerning the Related Content section, I encourage everyone to evaluate the content carefully.
I think the content is worthwhile, but it may contain opinions or language I don’t agree with.
Realize that I sometimes use phrases like “trans man”, “trans woman”, “transgender” or similar language for ease of communication. Obviously, as a conservative Christian, I don’t believe anyone has ever become the opposite sex.
Feel free to offer your comments below. Respectful comments without expletives and personal attacks will be posted and I will respond to them.
Comments are closed after sixty days due to spamming issues from internet bots. You can always send me an email at christiannewsjunkie@gmail.com if you want to comment on something afterwards, though.
I will continue to add videos and other items to the Related Content section as opportunities present themselves.