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Donald Trump is not typically known for counsel, particularly from international figures who often seek to praise and admire the American leader.

However, the Central American nation's strongman president Nayib Bukele has followed a different 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 US judiciary also garnered support from Trump allies, including an social media message by one-time supporter the billionaire, who has in the past amplified the Salvadoran's calls to oust US judges.

Unprecedented Threats to Judicial Independence

Experts note that Bukele's recent remarks come at a time of unmatched dangers to judicial independence and individual judges in the US, and during a phase where the Trump administration is employing similar authoritarian methods employed by rulers in nations such as Türkiye, the European state, India, and Bukele's own El Salvador to undermine democratic accountability.

Bukele's online call recently was just the latest in a long series of provocations and allegations he has made against the American judiciary, including a spring assertion that the US was “facing a judicial coup,” and his mockery of a federal judge's order to stop deportation flights transporting accused undocumented individuals to his nation's harsh prison system.

Attacks on Federal Judge

Bukele's demand for removal was also made amid online criticism on Oregon federal judge Judge Immergut by presidential advisor Stephen Miller, former AG Pam Bondi, Musk, and the president himself in a recent press gaggle.

Immergut had ordered injunctions blocking Trump from mobilizing the national guard, first in Oregon then in the West Coast state. The president has been pushing to send troops into Portland, which the president has characterized as “war-ravaged” based on small, peaceful protests outside the urban homeland security facility.

Record of Targeting Judges

The advisor, Bondi, and Musk have a long record of criticizing judges who have blocked Trump's executive orders or in other ways impeded the government's policy goals. Before resuming office this year, the president urged his followers against judges presiding over his civil and criminal trials, who were then inundated with threats and abuse.

Monitoring groups, law enforcement agencies, and the justices have highlighted a increased atmosphere of threats and intimidation in the months since he re-entered the presidency.

Increasing Risk Data

Based on data gathered by the US Marshals Service, in the current year through the third quarter, there were 562 incidents to nearly four hundred US justices, leading to more than eight hundred inquiries. 2025 has already eclipsed the first recorded year, and 2024, and is on track to exceed the previous year's record of 630 threats.

The threats are not just happening at the federal level. Information by Princeton's research project shows that there have been at least fifty-nine instances of threats, targeting, stalking, or violence committed against judges on the local level in the current year.

Analyst Insights on Root Causes

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

In May, the watchdog group published a detailed report alleging that “malicious and reckless statements from Trump administration members and allies align with escalating violent posts on social media.” It recorded “a fifty-four percent rise in demands for impeachment and violent threats against judges across social media platforms from the first two months 2025, the first full month of the president's term.”

Heidi Beirich, the founder of the organization, said: “The president's warnings against judges have definitely fueled digital abuse at judges and calls for impeachment. Targeting the judiciary is one more step in the administration's advance towards strongman rule.”

Global Strongman Tactics

That march towards autocracy has been well-trodden in the past decade in several nations, such as by the Salvadoran.

In several years ago, right after starting a second term in the face of constitutional prohibitions, the president's allies in congress voted to dismiss the nation's top prosecutor and several justices on the supreme court. The justices, who had provoked his ire by ruling against coronavirus measures, made way for replacements hand picked by Bukele.

The move mirrored the Hungarian leader's remodeling of the nation's judiciary in 2018; the Turkish president's judicial purges recently; and efforts at similar moves in Israel and the European country.

Undermining Judicial Independence

Experts say that the intimidation and verbal assaults in the US can be seen as efforts to weaken judicial independence in a system that offers no easy way for the executive to remove judges the administration disapproves of.

Meghan Leonard, an associate professor at the university who has studied democratic decline in free nations, said the White House had learned from the models set by authoritarians overseas.

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

Pointing to examples such as the advisor's persistent claims of broad executive power, she noted: “They directly criticize the judiciary by repeating repeatedly that it is not a co-equal branch in the separation of powers.

“They continue to redefine the debate by emphasizing their claim that the president has greater authority than this judicial branch, which is not how separation powers work.”

Leonard said: “Justices' only protection is people’s belief in the legitimacy of their capacity to make those decisions. Personal intimidation on top of eroding trust in courts may make judges think twice about judgments that go against the sitting government, which is, of course, massively problematic for court oversight and for democracy.”

Coercion Methods

Scheppele, professor of social science and global studies at Princeton University, has written about the use of “authoritarian law” by the such as 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 unwanted food orders with the recipient listed as a name, the child of Judge Esther Salas, who was killed at the residence in several years ago by a gunman aiming at the judge.

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

“Federal judges are guarded by the Secret Service and the federal police. And these are specialized law enforcement that sit institutionally inside the federal agency. And the former AG has been spearheading the attacks on justices.”

Government Goals

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