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The US President is not typically known for guidance, especially from international figures who often seek to flatter and admire the American leader.

However, El Salvador's authoritarian leader Bukele has followed a different approach by calling on the White House to emulate his actions in impeaching what he terms “dishonest judges.”

The call for the president to take action against the American court system also garnered support from Maga figures, such as an social media message by former close Trump ally Elon Musk, who has previously boosted Bukele's calls to oust US judges.

Growing Risks to Court Autonomy

Analysts say that Bukele's recent remarks come at a time of unprecedented dangers to judicial independence and specific justices in the United States, and during a period where the president's team is employing comparable authoritarian methods used by leaders in nations such as Türkiye, the European state, India, and his native El Salvador to weaken democratic accountability.

The president's social media statement recently was one more in a long series of taunts and allegations he has made against the US's legal system, including a March claim that the US was “experiencing a judicial coup,” and his mockery of a federal judge's order to stop removal operations sending suspected undocumented individuals to his nation's harsh correctional facilities.

Attacks on Federal Judge

Bukele's demand for removal was also issued during online criticism on the state's federal judge Karin Immergut by White House aide Miller, former AG Pam Bondi, Musk, and the president himself in a recent press gaggle.

The judge had ordered restraining orders blocking the administration from mobilizing the national guard, first in the state then in the West Coast state. Trump has been pushing to send troops into Portland, which the president has characterized as “battle-scarred” based on limited, peaceful protests outside the urban federal building.

Record of Targeting Judges

The advisor, the former AG, and the entrepreneur have a long record of criticizing judges who have blocked Trump's executive orders or otherwise hindered the government's policy goals. Before resuming office recently, the president urged his followers against judges overseeing his civil and criminal trials, who were then inundated with threats and abuse.

Watchdog organizations, law enforcement agencies, and the justices have pointed to a heightened atmosphere of threats and intimidation in the months since he returned to the presidency.

Rising Threat Statistics

According to data collected by the federal agency, in the current year through the end of September, there were over five hundred incidents to nearly four hundred federal judges, giving rise to more than eight hundred inquiries. 2025 has already eclipsed 2022, and last year, and is likely to top 2023's record of over six hundred threats.

The dangers are not just happening at the national level. Information by Princeton's research project shows that there have been at least 59 cases of threats, harassment, surveillance, or violence directed against judges on the local level in the current year.

Expert Analysis on Root Causes

Specialists state that the threats are a product of the rhetoric coming from top government officials.

In spring, the Global Project Against Hate and Extremism (GPAHE) published a detailed report claiming that “malicious and reckless statements from Trump administration members and supporters align with escalating aggressive posts on social media.” It recorded “a fifty-four percent increase in calls for impeachment and violent threats 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 founder of GPAHE, said: “The president's warnings against judges have certainly fueled online vitriol at judges and calls for impeachment. Targeting the judiciary is one more step in Trump’s advance towards authoritarianism.”

Global Authoritarian Tactics

This progression towards autocracy has been well-trodden in the past decade in multiple countries, such as by the Salvadoran.

In 2021, right after starting a second term despite constitutional prohibitions, the president's allies in congress voted to dismiss the country’s top prosecutor and several judges on the supreme court. The judges, who had provoked his ire by ruling against coronavirus measures, were replaced by new appointees selected by the leader.

The action echoed Viktor Orbán’s overhaul of the nation's judiciary in 2018; Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s court cleanups recently; and attempts at similar moves in the Middle Eastern state and Poland.

Undermining Court Autonomy

Analysts say that the intimidation and rhetorical attacks in the US can be viewed as attempts to weaken court autonomy in a system that provides no simple method for the president to dismiss judges the administration opposes.

Meghan Leonard, an academic at the university who has researched democratic decline in free nations, said the Trump administration had learned from the examples set by authoritarians abroad.

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

Pointing to instances such as the advisor's relentless claims of broad executive power, she noted: “They directly attack the judiciary by stating repeatedly that it is not a equal branch in the separation of powers.

“They persist in redefine the discussion by repeating their argument that the executive has greater authority than this judicial branch, which is not how separation powers work.”

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

Coercion Methods

Kim Lane Scheppele, academic of social science and global studies at Princeton University, has written about the use of “autocratic legalism” by the likes of Orbán and the Russian, and has warned about rising threats to judges in the US.

She pointed to a series of termed “pizza doxxings” this year, in which judges have received unsolicited pizza deliveries with the customer listed as Daniel Anderl, the son of Judge Esther Salas, who was killed at the judge’s home in 2020 by a gunman targeting Salas.

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

“US justices are protected by the Secret Service and the federal police. And these are specialized police units that sit structurally inside the federal agency. And Pam Bondi has been leading the criticism on justices.”

Government Goals

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