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Donald Trump rarely accepts guidance, particularly from foreign leaders who frequently seek to praise and admire the American leader.

But, El Salvador's strongman president Nayib Bukele has adopted a different strategy by urging the White House to follow his example in impeaching what he terms “corrupt judges.”

His appeal for the president to move against the American court system also received backing from Maga figures, such as an X post by former close Trump ally Elon Musk, who has previously amplified the Salvadoran's calls to oust US judges.

Unprecedented Threats to Court Autonomy

Analysts say that the leader's recent remarks come at a time of unmatched threats to judicial independence and specific justices in the US, and during a period where the president's team is using comparable authoritarian methods used by leaders in countries such as Türkiye, Hungary, the Asian nation, and his native the Central American country to weaken democratic accountability.

Bukele's social media statement last week was one more in a long series of provocations and allegations he has made against the American judiciary, such as a March assertion that the US was “facing a court takeover,” and his mockery of a court's order to halt deportation flights sending accused undocumented individuals to his nation's harsh prison system.

Criticism on Oregon Justice

Bukele's demand for removal was also made amid social media criticism on Oregon federal judge Karin Immergut by White House aide Miller, former AG Bondi, Elon Musk, and the president personally in a recent press gaggle.

Immergut had issued restraining orders preventing the administration from deploying the national guard, initially in Oregon then in California. Trump has been pushing to dispatch soldiers into the city, which the president has characterized as “war-ravaged” based on limited, peaceful demonstrations outside the city's federal building.

Record of Targeting Judges

The advisor, Bondi, and Musk have a history of attacking judges who have ruled against Trump's executive orders or otherwise impeded the administration's policy goals. Prior to resuming office this year, Trump urged his followers against judges overseeing his civil and criminal trials, who were then deluged with threats and harassment.

Watchdog organizations, law enforcement agencies, and judges themselves have highlighted a increased atmosphere of risks and intimidation in the months since he returned to the presidency.

Rising Risk Data

Based on data gathered by the federal agency, in 2025 through the third quarter, there were over five hundred threats to nearly four hundred federal judges, giving rise to more than eight hundred inquiries. 2025 has already eclipsed the first recorded year, and 2024, and is on track to top 2023's high of 630 reported incidents.

The dangers are not just happening at the national level. Data from Princeton's Bridging Divides Initiative shows that there have been at least fifty-nine cases of threats, targeting, surveillance, or violence directed against judges on the local level in 2025.

Expert Insights on Threat Sources

Specialists state that the threats are a result of the language coming from top government officials.

In spring, the watchdog group published a comprehensive report claiming that “harmful and highly irresponsible statements from Trump administration members and supporters coincide with escalating violent posts on social media.” It noted “a fifty-four percent increase in demands for impeachment and physical intimidation against judges across digital networks from January to February of this year, the initial period of the president's term.”

Heidi Beirich, the founder of GPAHE, said: “The president's threats against judges have certainly driven digital abuse at judges and demands for impeachment. Targeting the courts is another move in the administration's march towards authoritarianism.”

Global Authoritarian Tactics

This progression towards autocracy has been well-trodden in recent years in several nations, such as by Bukele.

In several years ago, right after commencing a new term despite constitutional prohibitions, Bukele’s allies in congress voted to dismiss the country’s attorney general and several judges on the supreme court. The judges, who had provoked his ire by rejecting pandemic policies, were replaced by replacements selected by the leader.

The action echoed the Hungarian leader's remodeling of Hungary’s court system in 2018; the Turkish president's court cleanups in 2019; and attempts at similar moves in the Middle Eastern state and Poland.

Undermining Judicial Independence

Analysts explain that the intimidation and rhetorical attacks in the US can be viewed as efforts to weaken court autonomy in a structure that provides no simple method for the executive to dismiss judges the administration disapproves of.

Leonard, an academic at the university who has researched authoritarian backsliding in free nations, said the White House had learned from the examples set by strongmen abroad.

“The government is observing at these achievements and setbacks. They know they’re not going to be able to pass any legislation that would undermine the judiciary,” she said.

Citing examples such as the advisor's persistent assertions of broad presidential authority, she added: “They directly criticize the judiciary by stating repeatedly that it is not a co-equal branch in the separation of powers.

“They continue to redefine the debate by repeating their argument that the executive has more power than this judicial branch, which is not how separation powers work.”

The professor said: “Judges' sole safeguard is public trust in the legitimacy of their ability to make those rulings. Personal intimidation on top of weakening trust in courts may make judges hesitate about judgments that go against the sitting government, which is, of course, massively problematic for court oversight and for the political system.”

Intimidation Tactics

Kim Lane Scheppele, professor of sociology and international affairs at Princeton University, has documented the use of “authoritarian law” by the likes of Orbán and Putin, and has warned about rising threats to judges in the US.

She pointed to a series of so-called “harassment deliveries” this year, in which judges have received unsolicited food orders with the recipient listed as Daniel Anderl, the son of Justice Salas, who was killed at the judge’s home in 2020 by a assailant targeting Salas.

“All knows what it means. ‘We know where you live. We’re coming for you,’” Scheppele said.

“US justices are guarded by the Secret Service and the federal police. And these are specialized law enforcement that sit structurally inside the Department of Justice. And Pam Bondi has been leading the criticism on federal judges.”

Government Goals

On the administration’s objectives, the expert said that “impeaching a federal judge is highly not going to happen because it’s very difficult to do. {Right now|Currently