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The US President is not typically known for advice, especially from foreign leaders who often attempt to flatter and compliment the American leader.

However, the Central American nation's strongman president Bukele has adopted a distinct approach by urging the Trump administration to emulate his actions in impeaching so-called “dishonest judges.”

His appeal for Trump to take action against the US judiciary also received backing from Maga figures, such as an social media message by one-time supporter Elon Musk, who has previously boosted the Salvadoran's calls to oust US judges.

Unprecedented Threats to Court Autonomy

Analysts say that Bukele's recent intervention occur of unprecedented threats to judicial independence and individual judges in the United States, and during a period where the Trump administration is using similar strong-arm tactics used by rulers in countries such as Türkiye, the European state, India, and Bukele's own the Central American country to undermine government oversight.

The president's online call recently was just the latest in a long series of provocations and claims he has leveled against the American judiciary, including a March assertion that the US was “experiencing a court takeover,” and ridicule of a court's order to halt deportation flights sending accused undocumented individuals to his nation's brutal correctional facilities.

Criticism on Federal Judge

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

Immergut had issued restraining orders blocking the administration from mobilizing the national guard, initially in the state then in California. The president has been eager to send soldiers into the city, which the president has characterized as “battle-scarred” based on limited, non-violent demonstrations outside the urban homeland security facility.

History of Targeting Justices

Miller, Bondi, and the entrepreneur have a history of attacking judges who have ruled against Trump's executive orders or otherwise impeded the government's political agenda. Prior to returning to power recently, Trump 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 pointed to a heightened climate of risks and coercion in the months since he re-entered the White House.

Rising Threat Statistics

According to data collected by the US Marshals Service, in 2025 through the end of September, there were over five hundred threats to 395 federal judges, leading to 805 investigations. This year has already surpassed 2022, and 2024, and is on track to exceed 2023's record of over six hundred threats.

The dangers are not just happening at the federal level. Information by Princeton's Bridging Divides Initiative shows that there have been at least 59 instances of intimidation, harassment, surveillance, or violence directed against judges on the state and municipal levels in the current year.

Expert Insights on Threat Sources

Specialists say that the threats are a product of the language coming from senior administration figures.

In spring, the Global Project Against Hate and Extremism (GPAHE) published a detailed report claiming that “harmful and highly irresponsible statements from Trump administration members and supporters align with escalating aggressive posts on online platforms.” It recorded “a fifty-four percent increase in demands for impeachment and physical intimidation against judges across social media platforms from January to February 2025, the first full month of the president's term.”

Heidi Beirich, the 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 authoritarianism.”

International Strongman Playbook

That march towards authoritarianism has been common in the past decade in several countries, such as by the Salvadoran.

In 2021, immediately after starting a new term despite constitutional prohibitions, Bukele’s parliamentary loyalists voted to remove the nation's attorney general and several justices on the constitutional court. The justices, who had provoked his ire by ruling against pandemic policies, made way for replacements selected by the leader.

The move echoed the Hungarian leader's overhaul of the nation's judiciary in 2018; the Turkish president's judicial purges recently; and attempts at comparable actions in Israel and the European country.

Undermining Judicial Independence

Analysts say that the intimidation and rhetorical attacks in the US can be seen as efforts to undermine court autonomy in a structure that provides no simple method for the executive to dismiss judges the administration disapproves of.

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

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

Pointing to examples such as Miller’s relentless assertions of nearly limitless executive power, she added: “They openly criticize the courts by stating repeatedly that it is not a co-equal branch in the government structure.

“They continue to redefine the discussion by emphasizing their claim that the executive has greater authority than this other co-equal branch, which is not how checks and balances work.”

Leonard said: “Justices' sole safeguard is people’s belief in the legitimacy of their capacity to make those rulings. Individual threats on top of weakening trust in courts may make judges think twice about judgments that go against the sitting government, which is, of course, highly concerning for judicial review and for democracy.”

Intimidation Tactics

Kim Lane Scheppele, professor of sociology and international affairs at the Ivy League school, 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 wave of so-called “harassment deliveries” recently, in which judges have received unwanted pizza deliveries with the customer listed as Daniel Anderl, the child of Judge Esther Salas, who was killed at the residence in 2020 by a assailant targeting the judge.

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

“Federal judges are guarded by the Secret Service and the federal police. And these are specialized law enforcement that are placed structurally inside the Department of Justice. And Pam Bondi has been leading the criticism on justices.”

Administration Aims

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