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The US President is not typically known for advice, particularly from foreign leaders who often seek to flatter and admire the American leader.

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

The call for Trump to move against the US judiciary also received backing from Trump allies, including an X post by one-time supporter the billionaire, who has previously boosted the Salvadoran's calls to impeach US judges.

Unprecedented Risks to Judicial Independence

Analysts say that the leader's recent remarks occur of unprecedented threats to judicial independence and specific justices in the US, and during a period where the president's team is employing similar strong-arm tactics used by rulers in nations such as Turkey, the European state, India, and Bukele's own the Central American country to weaken democratic accountability.

Bukele's social media call last week was one more in a string of taunts and claims he has made against the American judiciary, including a spring claim that the US was “facing a court takeover,” and ridicule of a federal judge's order to halt removal operations transporting accused undocumented individuals to his country's brutal prison system.

Criticism on Federal Judge

The Salvadoran's demand for removal was also made amid social media criticism on the state's justice Karin Immergut by presidential advisor Stephen Miller, attorney general Pam Bondi, Elon Musk, and the president personally in a latest media briefing.

Immergut had issued restraining orders preventing the administration from mobilizing the national guard, initially in Oregon then in California. Trump has been pushing to send soldiers into the city, which the president has characterized as “battle-scarred” based on small, non-violent protests outside the urban federal building.

History of Attacking Justices

Miller, Bondi, and Musk have a history of attacking judges who have blocked Trump's executive orders or in other ways hindered the government's political agenda. Before resuming office this year, Trump urged his followers against judges overseeing 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 months since he returned to the presidency.

Increasing Threat Statistics

According to information collected by the federal agency, in 2025 through the end of September, there were 562 incidents to nearly four hundred federal judges, giving rise to 805 investigations. 2025 has already surpassed 2022, and last year, and is on track to exceed the previous year's record of over six hundred threats.

The threats are not just happening at the federal level. Information by Princeton's research project indicates that there have been at least fifty-nine cases of intimidation, targeting, surveillance, or physical attacks committed against judges on the state and municipal levels in the current year.

Analyst Insights on Threat Sources

Specialists state that the intimidation are a result of the language coming from top government officials.

In May, the Global Project Against Hate and Extremism (GPAHE) published a detailed report claiming that “harmful and highly irresponsible statements from White House allies and supporters align with rising aggressive posts on social media.” It recorded “a fifty-four percent rise in demands for removal and violent threats against judges across digital networks from January to February of this year, the first full month of the president's term.”

Beirich, the co-founder of the organization, said: “Trump’s threats against judges have certainly fueled online vitriol at judges and calls for impeachment. Attacking the judiciary is one more step in the administration's march towards authoritarianism.”

International Strongman Playbook

That march towards autocracy has been common in the past decade in multiple nations, such as by the Salvadoran.

In several years ago, immediately after starting a new term despite legal bans, Bukele’s parliamentary loyalists voted to remove the country’s attorney general and several judges on the constitutional court. The justices, who had provoked his ire by rejecting pandemic policies, were replaced by replacements selected by Bukele.

The action echoed Viktor Orbán’s remodeling of the nation's judiciary in 2018; the Turkish president's court cleanups in 2019; and attempts at comparable actions in the Middle Eastern state and the European country.

Undermining Judicial Independence

Experts say that the intimidation and verbal assaults in the US can be viewed as attempts to undermine judicial independence in a system that offers no easy way for the executive to dismiss judges Trump opposes.

Leonard, an associate professor at the university who has studied authoritarian backsliding in free nations, said the White House had learned 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 enact any laws that would weaken the courts,” she said.

Citing instances such as Miller’s relentless claims of broad presidential authority, she noted: “They directly attack the judiciary by stating over and over that it is not a co-equal branch in the government structure.

“They persist in reframe the discussion by repeating their claim that the president has more power than this judicial branch, which is not how separation powers work.”

The professor said: “Justices' sole safeguard is people’s belief in the legitimacy of their capacity to make those decisions. Personal intimidation 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 judicial review and for the political system.”

Intimidation Tactics

Kim Lane Scheppele, professor of social science and international affairs at Princeton University, has documented the use of “authoritarian law” by the such as Orbán and Putin, and has warned about escalating dangers to judges in the US.

She pointed to a wave of termed “harassment deliveries” recently, 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 knows what it means. ‘We know where you live. We’re coming for you,’” the professor said.

“Federal judges are protected by the Secret Service and the Marshals Service. And those are both dedicated law enforcement that sit structurally inside the Department of Justice. And Pam Bondi has been spearheading the criticism on federal judges.”

Government Goals

On the administration’s aims, the expert said that “removing a federal judge is almost certainly not going to happen because it’s very difficult to do. {Right now|Currently