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Donald Trump rarely accepts advice, particularly from international figures who often attempt to praise and compliment the American leader.

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

The call for the president to move against the US judiciary also garnered support from Trump allies, such as an X post by former supporter the billionaire, who has in the past boosted the Salvadoran's calls to impeach US judges.

Growing Risks to Judicial Independence

Analysts note that Bukele's latest remarks occur of unprecedented dangers to court autonomy and specific justices in the United States, and during a period where the Trump administration is using similar authoritarian tactics employed by rulers in countries such as Türkiye, Hungary, the Asian nation, and Bukele's own the Central American country to weaken government oversight.

Bukele's social media statement recently was just the latest in a long series of provocations and claims he has made against the American judiciary, such as a March assertion that the US was “experiencing a judicial coup,” and his mockery of a court's ruling to stop removal operations transporting suspected illegal immigrants to his nation's brutal correctional facilities.

Attacks on Federal Judge

The Salvadoran's demand for removal was also issued during social media attacks on Oregon justice Karin Immergut by White House aide Stephen Miller, attorney general Pam Bondi, Musk, and Trump personally in a recent media briefing.

The judge had ordered restraining orders preventing Trump from mobilizing the military reserves, first in the state then in the West Coast state. Trump has been eager to dispatch soldiers into the city, which the leader has described 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 history of criticizing judges who have blocked Trump's executive orders or in other ways hindered the administration's policy goals. Before returning to power recently, the president urged his followers against judges presiding over his legal cases, who were then inundated with intimidation and harassment.

Watchdog organizations, law enforcement agencies, and judges themselves have highlighted a increased atmosphere of risks and coercion in the period since he re-entered the White House.

Increasing Risk Data

According to data gathered by the US Marshals Service, in the current year through the end of September, there were 562 incidents to 395 US justices, giving rise to more than eight hundred investigations. 2025 has already surpassed 2022, and 2024, and is on track to top 2023's record of 630 threats.

The dangers are not only happening at the national level. Data from Princeton's research project shows that there have been at least 59 cases of intimidation, targeting, surveillance, or violence committed against judges on the state and municipal levels in the current year.

Expert Insights on Root Causes

Specialists state that the intimidation are a product of the rhetoric coming from senior administration figures.

In spring, the Global Project Against Hate and Extremism (GPAHE) published a comprehensive report claiming that “malicious and reckless statements from Trump administration members and allies coincide with escalating violent posts on online platforms.” It recorded “a 54% increase in demands for removal and physical intimidation against judges across social media platforms from the first two months of this year, the first full month of the president's term.”

Heidi Beirich, the co-founder of GPAHE, said: “The president's threats against judges have certainly driven online vitriol at judges and calls for ouster. Targeting the courts is one more step in Trump’s march towards authoritarianism.”

International Strongman Playbook

This progression towards authoritarianism has been common in recent years in several countries, such as by the Salvadoran.

In 2021, right after starting a new term in the face of legal bans, Bukele’s allies in congress voted to dismiss the country’s top prosecutor and five justices on the constitutional court. The justices, who had provoked his ire by ruling against pandemic policies, were replaced by new appointees selected by Bukele.

The move mirrored the Hungarian leader's remodeling of Hungary’s court system in 2018; Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s judicial purges recently; and attempts at comparable actions in Israel and Poland.

Undermining Court Autonomy

Experts explain that the threats and rhetorical attacks in the US can be seen as efforts to weaken judicial independence in a system that offers no easy way for the executive to dismiss judges Trump disapproves of.

Leonard, an associate professor at the university who has studied democratic decline in democracies, said the Trump administration had taken cues 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 enact any laws that would undermine the courts,” she said.

Pointing to examples such as Miller’s persistent claims of broad presidential authority, she noted: “They directly attack the judiciary by repeating over and over that it is not a equal branch in the separation of powers.

“They continue to reframe the debate by emphasizing their argument that the president has more power than this other co-equal branch, which is not how checks and balances work.”

The professor said: “Judges' sole safeguard is people’s belief in the authority of their capacity to make those decisions. Individual threats on top of eroding trust in courts may make judges hesitate about judgments that go against the current administration, which is, of course, highly concerning for court oversight and for the political system.”

Intimidation Tactics

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

She pointed to a series of so-called “pizza doxxings” this year, in which judges have received unsolicited food orders with the recipient listed as Daniel Anderl, the child of Justice Salas, who was killed at the residence in 2020 by a gunman targeting Salas.

“Everyone knows what it means. ‘Your address is known. We’re coming for you,’” Scheppele said.

“Federal judges are protected by the presidential protection and the federal police. And these are specialized police units that are placed institutionally inside the Department of Justice. And Pam Bondi has been spearheading the attacks on federal judges.”

Government Goals

Regarding the government's objectives, the expert said that “impeaching a US justice is almost certainly not going to happen because it’s so hard to do. {Right now|Currently