🔗 Share this article

Donald Trump does not usually take advice, especially from foreign leaders who frequently attempt to flatter and compliment the US president.

However, El Salvador's strongman president Bukele has followed a different strategy by calling on the White House to follow his example in removing so-called “corrupt judges.”

The call for Trump to take action against the American court system also garnered backing from Maga figures, including an social media message by one-time supporter Elon Musk, who has previously amplified Bukele's demands to oust US judges.

Unprecedented Threats to Judicial Independence

Analysts say that the leader's recent remarks come at a time of unmatched dangers to judicial independence and individual judges in the United States, and during a phase where the Trump administration is employing comparable authoritarian tactics used by rulers in nations such as Turkey, Hungary, India, and his native El Salvador to weaken government oversight.

The president's online call last week was just the latest in a long series of provocations and claims he has made against the US's legal system, such as a spring claim that the US was “experiencing a judicial coup,” and ridicule of a federal judge's ruling to stop deportation flights transporting accused illegal immigrants to his nation's harsh prison system.

Attacks on Oregon Justice

Bukele's demand for removal was also made amid online criticism on the state's justice Karin Immergut by presidential advisor Miller, former AG Pam Bondi, Elon Musk, and Trump personally in a latest media briefing.

Immergut had ordered injunctions blocking Trump from deploying the military reserves, initially in the state then in California. Trump has been pushing to dispatch soldiers into Portland, which the president has characterized as “battle-scarred” based on small, non-violent protests outside the city's federal building.

History of Targeting Judges

The advisor, Bondi, and the entrepreneur have a history of criticizing judges who have blocked Trump's executive orders or in other ways impeded the government's policy goals. Prior to resuming office this year, the president directed his followers against judges overseeing his legal cases, who were then inundated with threats and harassment.

Monitoring groups, law enforcement agencies, and judges themselves have highlighted a heightened climate of threats and intimidation in the months since he returned to the presidency.

Increasing Risk Data

Based on information collected by the US Marshals Service, in 2025 through the third quarter, there were over five hundred threats to nearly four hundred federal judges, leading to 805 inquiries. This year has already surpassed the first recorded year, and last year, and is likely to exceed 2023's high of 630 reported incidents.

The dangers are not only happening at the national level. Information by Princeton's research project indicates that there have been at least fifty-nine cases of threats, harassment, stalking, or violence committed against judges on the state and municipal levels in the current year.

Analyst Analysis on Threat Sources

Specialists state that the threats are a product of the language 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 allies align with rising aggressive posts on online platforms.” It noted “a 54% rise in calls for impeachment and violent threats against judges across digital networks from January to February of this year, the initial period of Trump’s administration.”

Beirich, the founder of the organization, said: “Trump’s threats against judges have definitely driven online vitriol at judges and calls for ouster. Attacking the judiciary is another move in Trump’s advance towards authoritarianism.”

International Strongman Tactics

This progression towards autocracy has been common in recent years in several nations, including by Bukele.

In 2021, immediately after starting a new term in the face of constitutional prohibitions, Bukele’s allies in congress voted to remove the nation's attorney general and several justices on the supreme court. The judges, who had provoked his ire by ruling against coronavirus measures, made way for new appointees selected by the leader.

The action mirrored Viktor Orbán’s overhaul of the nation's judiciary in 2018; Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s court cleanups recently; and efforts at comparable actions in Israel and the European country.

Weakening Court Autonomy

Analysts say that the intimidation and verbal assaults in the US can be seen as efforts to weaken court autonomy in a structure that offers no easy way for the executive to dismiss judges the administration opposes.

Meghan Leonard, an associate professor at the university who has studied authoritarian backsliding in free nations, said the White House had taken cues from the examples set by strongmen abroad.

“The administration is observing at these achievements 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 nearly limitless executive power, she added: “They directly attack the judiciary by repeating over and over that it is not a co-equal branch in the separation of powers.

“They persist in redefine the debate by repeating their claim that the executive has more power than this judicial branch, which is not how checks and balances work.”

Leonard said: “Judges' only protection is public trust in the authority of their ability to make those decisions. Individual threats on top of eroding institutional legitimacy may make judges hesitate about judgments that go against the current administration, which is, of course, massively problematic for court oversight and for democracy.”

Intimidation Tactics

Kim Lane Scheppele, academic of sociology and global studies at the Ivy League school, has written about the use of “authoritarian law” by the likes of Orbán and the Russian, and has warned about rising threats to judges in the US.

She highlighted a series of termed “pizza doxxings” this year, in which judges have received unwanted pizza deliveries with the customer listed as Daniel Anderl, the child of Justice Salas, who was murdered at the judge’s home in 2020 by a assailant aiming at the judge.

“Everyone understands what it means. ‘We know where you live. We’re coming for you,’” Scheppele said.

“Federal judges are protected by the Secret Service and the Marshals Service. And those are both specialized police units that sit 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, Scheppele said that “impeaching a US justice is highly not going to happen because it’s so hard to do. {Right now|Currently