🔗 Share this article

The US President rarely accepts counsel, especially from international figures who frequently seek to flatter and compliment the US president.

However, El Salvador's authoritarian leader Nayib Bukele has adopted a distinct approach by calling on the White House to emulate his actions in removing what he terms “corrupt judges.”

The call for the president to move against the American court system also garnered backing from Trump allies, including an X post by one-time close Trump ally the billionaire, who has previously boosted Bukele's calls to impeach US judges.

Unprecedented Risks to Judicial Independence

Experts note that the leader's latest intervention come at a time of unmatched threats to court autonomy and individual judges in the US, and during a period where the Trump administration is using similar authoritarian tactics used by rulers in countries such as Türkiye, the European state, the Asian nation, and his native El Salvador to undermine government oversight.

The president's online statement last week was one more in a string of provocations and allegations he has leveled against the US's legal system, including a March assertion that the US was “experiencing a court takeover,” and ridicule of a federal judge's order to stop removal operations sending suspected undocumented individuals to his country's harsh correctional facilities.

Attacks on Oregon Justice

Bukele's demand for removal was also made amid social media criticism on the state's federal judge Karin Immergut by presidential advisor Miller, former AG Bondi, Musk, and Trump himself in a latest press gaggle.

Immergut had issued restraining orders blocking Trump from mobilizing the military reserves, initially in the state then in the West Coast state. The president has been pushing to send troops into the city, which the leader has characterized as “battle-scarred” based on small, non-violent demonstrations outside the city's homeland security facility.

Record of Targeting Justices

The advisor, Bondi, and Musk have a long record of criticizing judges who have ruled against Trump's executive orders or otherwise impeded the administration's political agenda. Before resuming office recently, Trump urged his followers against judges presiding over his civil and criminal trials, who were then inundated with threats and harassment.

Monitoring groups, law enforcement agencies, and judges themselves have pointed to a heightened atmosphere of risks and coercion in the period since he returned to the White House.

Rising Risk Data

Based on information collected by the federal agency, in 2025 through the third quarter, there were over five hundred incidents to nearly four hundred US justices, leading to more than eight hundred investigations. This year has already eclipsed 2022, and last year, and is likely to exceed the previous year's high of over six hundred threats.

The dangers are not just happening at the federal level. Data from the university's research project indicates that there have been at least 59 cases of intimidation, harassment, stalking, or physical attacks committed against judges on the state and municipal levels in 2025.

Expert Analysis on Root Causes

Experts state that the intimidation are a result of the language coming from senior administration figures.

In May, the watchdog group published a detailed report claiming that “malicious and reckless statements from Trump administration members and allies align with escalating aggressive posts on social media.” It noted “a fifty-four percent increase in calls for removal and physical intimidation against judges across social media platforms from January to February 2025, the initial period of the president's term.”

Heidi Beirich, the co-founder of the organization, said: “The president's threats against judges have definitely driven online vitriol at judges and demands for ouster. Attacking the courts is another move in Trump’s march towards strongman rule.”

Global Strongman Tactics

That march towards autocracy has been common in recent years in several nations, such as by the Salvadoran.

In 2021, right after commencing a second term despite legal bans, the president's parliamentary loyalists voted to remove the country’s attorney general and several judges on the constitutional court. The judges, who had angered him by ruling against coronavirus measures, made way for replacements selected by Bukele.

The action echoed the Hungarian leader's remodeling of Hungary’s court system in 2018; the Turkish president's court cleanups recently; and attempts at comparable actions in the Middle Eastern state and the European country.

Undermining Court Autonomy

Analysts explain that the threats and rhetorical attacks in the US can be viewed as efforts to weaken judicial independence in a structure that offers no easy way for the president to remove judges Trump disapproves of.

Meghan Leonard, an associate professor at Illinois State University who has researched democratic decline in democracies, said the White House had learned from the models set by strongmen overseas.

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

Citing examples such as Miller’s relentless assertions of broad executive power, she noted: “They openly criticize the courts by repeating repeatedly that it is not a co-equal branch in the government structure.

“They persist in reframe the discussion 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 people’s belief in the authority of their ability to make those rulings. Individual threats on top of eroding institutional legitimacy may make judges think twice about judgments that go against the current administration, which is, of course, highly concerning for court oversight and for the political system.”

Coercion Methods

Scheppele, professor of social science and global studies at the Ivy League school, has documented the use of “authoritarian law” by the such as Orbán and the Russian, and has warned about escalating dangers to judges in the US.

She pointed to a series of so-called “harassment deliveries” this year, in which judges have received unwanted pizza deliveries with the recipient listed as a name, the child of Justice Salas, who was killed at the judge’s home in 2020 by a gunman aiming at Salas.

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

“Federal judges are protected by the Secret Service and the federal police. And these are specialized police units that are placed institutionally inside the federal agency. And Pam Bondi has been leading the criticism on federal judges.”

Administration Aims

Regarding the government's aims, Scheppele said that “impeaching a federal judge is highly not going to happen because it’s very difficult to do. {Right now|Currently