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The US President rarely accepts guidance, particularly from international figures who frequently seek to praise and admire the American leader.

However, El Salvador's strongman president Nayib Bukele has followed a different approach by calling on the White House to emulate his actions in impeaching so-called “dishonest judges.”

His appeal for Trump to move against the US judiciary also received backing from Maga figures, such as an X post by former supporter Elon Musk, who has in the past boosted the Salvadoran's calls to oust US judges.

Unprecedented Risks to Judicial Independence

Analysts note that the leader's recent remarks occur of unmatched dangers to court autonomy and individual judges in the United States, and during a phase where the president's team is employing similar strong-arm tactics employed by leaders in nations 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 string of taunts and allegations he has made against the American judiciary, including a March claim that the US was “facing a court takeover,” and his mockery of a court's order to halt deportation flights transporting suspected illegal immigrants to his country's brutal correctional facilities.

Criticism on Federal Judge

Bukele's demand for removal was also made amid social media criticism on Oregon justice Judge Immergut by White House aide Stephen Miller, former AG Bondi, Musk, and the president personally in a recent media briefing.

The judge had ordered restraining orders preventing Trump from mobilizing the national guard, initially in the state then in the West Coast state. The president has been eager to send soldiers into Portland, which the leader has characterized as “battle-scarred” based on limited, peaceful demonstrations outside the urban federal building.

Record of Targeting Judges

Miller, the former AG, and Musk have a history of attacking judges who have blocked Trump's executive orders or otherwise impeded the administration's policy goals. Before returning to power recently, Trump directed his followers against judges overseeing his legal cases, who were then deluged with intimidation and abuse.

Monitoring groups, 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.

Rising Risk Data

According to data collected by the federal agency, in 2025 through the third quarter, there were over five hundred threats to 395 US justices, leading to more than eight hundred investigations. This year has already eclipsed the first recorded year, and last year, and is on track to exceed the previous year's high of over six hundred threats.

The threats are not only happening at the national level. Information by the university's Bridging Divides Initiative indicates that there have been at least fifty-nine instances of threats, harassment, surveillance, or physical attacks committed against judges on the local level in the current year.

Expert Analysis on Threat Sources

Specialists say that the intimidation are a product of the language coming from top government officials.

In May, the Global Project Against Hate and Extremism (GPAHE) published a detailed report alleging that “malicious and reckless statements from White House allies and supporters coincide with rising aggressive posts on online platforms.” It noted “a 54% increase in demands for impeachment and violent threats against judges across digital networks from the first two months of this year, the initial period of the president's term.”

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

Global Strongman Tactics

That march towards authoritarianism has been common in the past decade in multiple nations, including by the Salvadoran.

In several years ago, immediately after starting a second term in the face of constitutional prohibitions, the president's parliamentary loyalists voted to remove the nation's attorney general and several justices on the supreme court. The judges, who had provoked his ire by rejecting pandemic policies, were replaced by replacements hand picked by the leader.

The action echoed Viktor Orbán’s overhaul of Hungary’s court system several years back; the Turkish president's court cleanups recently; and attempts at similar moves in Israel and the European country.

Weakening Court Autonomy

Analysts say that the threats and verbal assaults in the US can be seen as efforts to weaken judicial independence in a structure that offers no easy way for the executive to remove judges Trump opposes.

Leonard, an associate professor at the university who has studied authoritarian backsliding in democracies, said the Trump administration had learned from the models set by authoritarians abroad.

“The government is looking around at these successes and failures. They know they’re not going to be able to pass any laws that would weaken the courts,” she said.

Pointing to instances such as Miller’s persistent claims of nearly limitless executive power, she noted: “They directly criticize the judiciary by stating over and over that it is not a co-equal branch in the separation of powers.

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

Leonard said: “Judges' only protection is public trust in the legitimacy of their capacity 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, massively problematic for judicial review and for democracy.”

Intimidation Tactics

Scheppele, professor of social science and global studies at the Ivy League school, has written about the use of “autocratic legalism” by the likes of Orbán and the Russian, and has spoken out about escalating dangers to judges in the US.

She highlighted a series of termed “pizza doxxings” this year, in which judges have received unwanted food orders with the customer listed as Daniel Anderl, the child of Justice Salas, who was murdered at the residence in 2020 by a gunman targeting the judge.

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

“US justices are guarded by the presidential protection and the federal police. And those are both dedicated police units that are placed structurally inside the federal agency. And the former AG has been leading the criticism on justices.”

Government Goals

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