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The US President is not typically known for guidance, particularly from foreign leaders who frequently attempt to flatter and admire the US president.

However, El Salvador's authoritarian leader Nayib Bukele has followed a distinct strategy by calling on the Trump administration to follow his example in removing so-called “corrupt judges.”

The call for the president to move against the US judiciary also garnered backing from Trump allies, such as an social media message by former supporter the billionaire, who has in the past amplified Bukele's demands to oust US judges.

Unprecedented Risks to Judicial Independence

Experts say that Bukele's latest remarks occur of unmatched threats to court autonomy and individual judges in the United States, and during a phase where the Trump administration is employing comparable strong-arm tactics employed by rulers in nations such as Turkey, Hungary, India, and his native the Central American country to weaken democratic accountability.

Bukele's online statement last week was one more in a string of provocations and allegations he has leveled against the US's legal system, such as a March assertion that the US was “facing a judicial coup,” and ridicule of a federal judge's order to stop deportation flights transporting accused undocumented individuals to his country's harsh prison system.

Criticism on Oregon Justice

The Salvadoran's demand for removal was also made amid social media criticism on Oregon federal judge Karin Immergut by White House aide Stephen Miller, former AG Bondi, Musk, and the president personally in a latest media briefing.

The judge had issued 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 dispatch troops into Portland, which the leader has characterized as “war-ravaged” based on limited, peaceful demonstrations outside the city's homeland security facility.

History of Targeting Justices

The advisor, Bondi, and the entrepreneur have a history of criticizing judges who have ruled against presidential directives or otherwise impeded the administration's political agenda. Before resuming office this year, the president urged his followers against judges presiding over his legal cases, who were then deluged with intimidation and abuse.

Monitoring groups, police departments, and the justices have pointed to a heightened climate of risks and coercion in the period since he re-entered the White House.

Increasing Risk Data

Based on data gathered by the federal agency, in 2025 through the third quarter, there were 562 threats to 395 federal judges, leading to 805 investigations. This year has already surpassed the first recorded year, and 2024, and is on track to exceed the previous year's high of 630 reported incidents.

The threats are not only happening at the federal level. Information by Princeton's Bridging Divides Initiative shows that there have been at least 59 cases of intimidation, targeting, surveillance, or physical attacks directed against judges on the local level in 2025.

Analyst Insights on Threat Sources

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

In May, the watchdog group published a detailed report alleging that “malicious and highly irresponsible statements from White House allies and allies coincide with escalating violent posts on online platforms.” It recorded “a 54% rise in demands for impeachment and violent threats against judges across digital networks from January to February 2025, the initial period of the president's term.”

Heidi Beirich, the founder of GPAHE, said: “Trump’s warnings against judges have certainly driven online vitriol at judges and calls for impeachment. Attacking the judiciary is another move in Trump’s advance towards strongman rule.”

Global Authoritarian Playbook

This progression towards authoritarianism has been well-trodden in recent years in several countries, including by the Salvadoran.

In 2021, immediately after commencing a new term in the face of legal bans, Bukele’s parliamentary loyalists voted to remove the country’s top prosecutor and several judges on the supreme court. The justices, who had angered him by ruling against coronavirus measures, made way for replacements hand picked by Bukele.

The move echoed Viktor Orbán’s remodeling of Hungary’s court system in 2018; the Turkish president's judicial purges in 2019; and attempts at comparable actions in the Middle Eastern state and the European country.

Weakening Judicial Independence

Experts say that the threats and verbal assaults in the US can be viewed as efforts to undermine judicial independence in a system that offers no easy way for the president to dismiss judges Trump opposes.

Leonard, an associate professor at the university who has researched democratic decline in democracies, said the White House had learned from the examples set by authoritarians overseas.

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

Pointing to examples such as Miller’s persistent assertions of broad presidential authority, she added: “They openly criticize the courts by stating over and over that it is not a co-equal branch in the government structure.

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

The professor said: “Justices' only protection is public trust in the authority of their capacity to make those decisions. Individual threats on top of eroding institutional legitimacy may make judges think twice about decisions that go against the current administration, which is, of course, massively problematic for court oversight and for the political system.”

Intimidation Tactics

Kim Lane Scheppele, academic of sociology 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 spoken out about escalating dangers to judges in the US.

She pointed to a series of termed “harassment deliveries” this year, in which judges have received unsolicited pizza deliveries with the recipient listed as Daniel Anderl, the son of Justice Salas, who was killed at the judge’s home in several years ago by a assailant targeting the judge.

“Everyone knows what it means. ‘Your address is known. You are a target,’” the professor said.

“US justices are guarded by the presidential protection and the Marshals Service. And those are both dedicated police units that sit institutionally inside the Department of Justice. And the former AG has been leading the attacks on federal judges.”

Government Goals

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