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Donald Trump is not typically known for advice, particularly from international figures who frequently attempt to flatter and compliment the American leader.

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

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

Unprecedented Risks to Court Autonomy

Analysts note that the leader's latest intervention occur of unmatched threats to judicial independence and individual judges in the United States, and during a phase where the president's team is employing similar strong-arm tactics used by rulers in nations such as Turkey, Hungary, India, and his native the Central American country to undermine democratic accountability.

The president's online statement recently was just the latest in a long series of taunts and allegations he has made against the American judiciary, such as a March claim that the US was “experiencing a judicial coup,” and ridicule of a federal judge's ruling to halt deportation flights sending suspected illegal immigrants to his nation's harsh prison system.

Attacks on Oregon Justice

The Salvadoran's impeachment call was also issued during social media criticism on the state's justice Judge Immergut by White House aide Stephen Miller, former AG Pam Bondi, Elon 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 dispatch soldiers into Portland, which the president has described as “battle-scarred” based on small, non-violent demonstrations outside the city's federal building.

Record of Attacking Judges

Miller, the former AG, and the entrepreneur have a long record of attacking judges who have ruled against Trump's executive orders or in other ways hindered the government's political agenda. Before resuming office this year, the president directed his supporters against judges presiding over his civil and criminal trials, who were then inundated with threats and harassment.

Watchdog organizations, police departments, and judges themselves have highlighted a increased climate of risks and intimidation in the period since he re-entered the White House.

Rising Risk Data

According to information collected by the federal agency, in 2025 through the third quarter, there were over five hundred incidents to nearly four hundred federal judges, giving rise to more than eight hundred inquiries. This year has already surpassed the first recorded year, and last year, and is likely to exceed the previous year's high of 630 threats.

The threats are not only happening at the federal level. Data from the university's Bridging Divides Initiative shows that there have been at least fifty-nine cases of intimidation, harassment, stalking, or physical attacks directed against judges on the local level in 2025.

Expert Analysis 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 comprehensive report alleging that “malicious and reckless statements from Trump administration members and allies coincide with rising violent posts on social media.” It noted “a fifty-four percent increase in demands for removal and violent threats against judges across social media platforms from the first two months of this year, the initial period of Trump’s administration.”

Heidi Beirich, the co-founder of the organization, said: “The president's threats against judges have certainly driven online vitriol at judges and demands for impeachment. Targeting the judiciary is another move in Trump’s advance towards strongman rule.”

International Strongman Tactics

This progression towards authoritarianism has been common in the past decade in multiple countries, including by the Salvadoran.

In 2021, right after starting a new term despite constitutional prohibitions, Bukele’s parliamentary loyalists voted to dismiss the nation's top prosecutor and five judges on the supreme court. The judges, who had provoked his ire by ruling against pandemic policies, were replaced by new appointees hand picked by Bukele.

The action echoed the Hungarian leader's overhaul of Hungary’s court system several years back; the Turkish president's judicial purges recently; and efforts at comparable actions in Israel and Poland.

Undermining Court Autonomy

Analysts say that the intimidation and rhetorical attacks in the US can be viewed as attempts to weaken judicial independence in a system that provides no simple method for the president to remove judges Trump opposes.

Meghan Leonard, an academic at Illinois State University who has researched democratic decline in free nations, said the White House had learned from the examples set by strongmen overseas.

“The government is looking around at these achievements and setbacks. They know they’re not going to be able to enact any legislation that would undermine the courts,” she said.

Citing examples such as Miller’s persistent claims of broad executive power, she noted: “They directly attack the judiciary by repeating over and over that it is not a equal branch in the separation of powers.

“They persist in redefine the debate by repeating their argument that the president has greater authority than this other co-equal branch, which is not how separation powers work.”

Leonard said: “Justices' only protection is public trust in the legitimacy of their capacity to make those decisions. Personal intimidation on top of weakening institutional legitimacy may make judges hesitate about decisions that go against the sitting government, which is, of course, massively problematic for judicial review and for democracy.”

Coercion Methods

Scheppele, academic of social science and international affairs at Princeton University, has documented the use of “authoritarian law” by the likes of Orbán and the Russian, and has warned about rising dangers to judges in the US.

She pointed to a series of so-called “pizza doxxings” this year, in which judges have received unwanted food orders with the customer listed as a name, the child of Justice Salas, who was murdered at the judge’s home in several years ago by a assailant targeting the judge.

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

“Federal judges are protected by the Secret Service and the federal police. And those are both specialized police units that are placed institutionally inside the Department of Justice. And the former AG has been leading the criticism on justices.”

Government Goals

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