🔗 Share this article

Donald Trump does not usually take counsel, especially from foreign leaders who frequently attempt to praise and compliment the American leader.

However, the Central American nation's authoritarian leader Bukele has adopted a distinct strategy by urging the White House to emulate his actions in impeaching so-called “corrupt judges.”

The call for Trump to move against the American court system also garnered support from Trump allies, such as an X post by former close Trump ally Elon Musk, who has previously boosted Bukele's calls to oust US judges.

Growing Risks to Court Autonomy

Experts say that the leader's recent remarks come at a time of unprecedented threats to judicial independence and individual judges in the US, and during a period where the president's team is employing similar strong-arm methods used by leaders in nations such as Turkey, the European state, the Asian nation, and Bukele's own El Salvador to undermine government oversight.

The president's online statement last week was just the latest in a string of taunts and claims he has leveled against the American judiciary, such as a spring assertion that the US was “experiencing a judicial coup,” and ridicule of a court's order to halt removal operations transporting suspected undocumented individuals to his country's harsh prison system.

Criticism on Oregon Justice

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

The judge had issued injunctions blocking the administration from mobilizing the national guard, initially in Oregon then in California. The president has been eager to send troops into Portland, which the leader has described as “battle-scarred” based on small, non-violent demonstrations outside the city's federal building.

History of Targeting Justices

Miller, the former AG, and Musk have a long record of criticizing judges who have blocked Trump's executive orders or otherwise impeded the government's political agenda. Before returning to power recently, the president directed his supporters against judges overseeing his legal cases, who were then inundated with threats and abuse.

Watchdog organizations, police departments, and judges themselves have pointed to a heightened climate of threats and coercion in the months since he re-entered the White House.

Rising Risk Data

Based on data gathered by the federal agency, in 2025 through the third quarter, there were over five hundred incidents to nearly four hundred US justices, giving rise to more than eight hundred inquiries. This year has already eclipsed 2022, and 2024, and is on track to top 2023's high of over six hundred reported incidents.

The dangers are not just happening at the federal level. Data from the university's research project indicates that there have been at least 59 cases of threats, harassment, surveillance, or physical attacks directed against judges on the state and municipal levels in the current year.

Expert Analysis on Threat Sources

Experts state that the intimidation are a product of the language coming from senior administration figures.

In spring, the watchdog group published a comprehensive report alleging that “harmful and reckless statements from White House allies and supporters coincide with rising aggressive posts on online platforms.” It recorded “a 54% rise in demands for removal and violent threats against judges across digital networks from January to February of this year, the initial period of the president's term.”

Heidi Beirich, the founder of the organization, said: “The president's warnings against judges have certainly driven online vitriol at judges and demands for impeachment. Targeting the courts is one more step in the administration's march towards strongman rule.”

Global Authoritarian Playbook

That march towards autocracy has been common in the past decade in several countries, including by Bukele.

In several years ago, right after commencing a new term despite constitutional prohibitions, the president's parliamentary loyalists voted to remove the country’s top prosecutor and several justices on the supreme court. The justices, who had provoked his ire by rejecting coronavirus measures, were replaced by new appointees hand picked by the leader.

The action mirrored Viktor Orbán’s remodeling of the nation's judiciary several years back; the Turkish president's court cleanups recently; and attempts at similar moves in the Middle Eastern state and the European country.

Weakening Judicial Independence

Analysts explain that the threats and verbal assaults in the US can be viewed as efforts to weaken judicial independence in a structure that provides no simple method for the president to dismiss judges Trump disapproves of.

Meghan Leonard, an academic at Illinois State University who has researched democratic decline in democracies, said the Trump administration had learned from the models set by strongmen overseas.

“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 undermine the judiciary,” she said.

Pointing to instances such as the advisor's persistent assertions of nearly limitless executive power, she added: “They directly criticize the courts by stating repeatedly that it is not a equal branch in the separation of powers.

“They persist in reframe the discussion by emphasizing their argument that the executive has more power 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 rulings. Personal intimidation on top of weakening trust in courts may make judges think twice about judgments that go against the current administration, which is, of course, highly concerning for judicial review and for democracy.”

Coercion Methods

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

She highlighted a series of termed “harassment deliveries” this year, in which judges have received unsolicited pizza deliveries with the customer listed as Daniel Anderl, the son of Justice Salas, who was killed at the residence in 2020 by a assailant targeting Salas.

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

“Federal judges are protected by the presidential protection and the federal police. And these are dedicated police units that are placed institutionally inside the Department of Justice. And the former AG has been spearheading the criticism on federal judges.”

Government Goals

On the administration’s aims, the expert said that “impeaching a federal judge is highly not going to happen because it’s so hard to do. {Right now|Currently