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Donald Trump rarely accepts advice, particularly from international figures who frequently attempt to flatter and admire the American leader.

However, El Salvador's authoritarian leader Nayib Bukele has adopted a different strategy by calling on the Trump administration to emulate his actions in impeaching what he terms “corrupt judges.”

The call for Trump to move against the US judiciary also received backing from Trump allies, such as an X post by one-time supporter the billionaire, who has previously boosted Bukele's demands to oust US judges.

Unprecedented Risks to Court Autonomy

Analysts say that the leader's latest remarks come at a time of unprecedented dangers to judicial independence and individual judges in the United States, and during a phase where the Trump administration is using similar authoritarian tactics used by leaders in countries such as Turkey, Hungary, India, and his native El Salvador to weaken democratic accountability.

The president's online statement last week was one more in a string of provocations and claims he has made against the American judiciary, such as a spring assertion that the US was “experiencing a judicial coup,” and his mockery of a federal judge's ruling to halt removal operations transporting accused illegal immigrants to his country's harsh correctional facilities.

Attacks on Oregon Justice

Bukele's demand for removal was also made during social media attacks on Oregon justice Karin Immergut by presidential advisor Miller, former AG Pam Bondi, Musk, and Trump personally in a latest media briefing.

Immergut had ordered injunctions preventing Trump from mobilizing the military reserves, first in Oregon then in the West Coast state. The president has been pushing to dispatch troops into the city, which the president has described as “battle-scarred” based on limited, peaceful protests outside the city's federal building.

Record of Attacking Judges

Miller, Bondi, and the entrepreneur have a history of criticizing judges who have blocked presidential directives or otherwise hindered the government's policy goals. Prior to returning to power recently, Trump urged his followers against judges overseeing his civil and criminal trials, who were then deluged with intimidation and abuse.

Monitoring groups, police departments, and the justices have pointed to a increased climate of risks and coercion in the period since he re-entered the presidency.

Rising Risk Data

Based on information collected by the federal agency, in the current year through the third quarter, there were over five hundred incidents to nearly four hundred US justices, leading to more than eight hundred inquiries. 2025 has already eclipsed 2022, and 2024, and is on track to top the previous year's record of over six hundred reported incidents.

The threats are not just happening at the federal level. Data from the university's Bridging Divides Initiative shows that there have been at least fifty-nine instances of intimidation, harassment, surveillance, or violence committed against judges on the state and municipal levels in the current year.

Expert Insights on Root Causes

Specialists state that the threats are a product of the rhetoric coming from senior administration figures.

In spring, the Global Project Against Hate and Extremism (GPAHE) published a detailed report claiming that “malicious and highly irresponsible statements from Trump administration members and allies align with rising aggressive posts on online platforms.” It recorded “a fifty-four percent increase in demands for impeachment and violent threats against judges across social media platforms from the first two months 2025, the first full month of Trump’s administration.”

Beirich, the co-founder of GPAHE, said: “The president's threats against judges have definitely driven online vitriol at judges and demands for ouster. Targeting the courts is one more step in Trump’s march towards authoritarianism.”

Global Authoritarian Playbook

That march towards autocracy has been well-trodden in the past decade in multiple countries, including by the Salvadoran.

In 2021, immediately after starting a second term despite constitutional prohibitions, the president's allies in congress voted to remove the country’s top prosecutor and several justices on the constitutional court. The justices, who had provoked his ire by ruling against pandemic policies, made way for replacements hand picked by the leader.

The action echoed the Hungarian leader's remodeling of the nation's judiciary several years back; Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s court cleanups in 2019; and efforts at comparable actions in the Middle Eastern state and the European country.

Weakening Judicial Independence

Analysts say that the threats and rhetorical attacks in the US can be viewed as attempts to undermine judicial independence in a structure that offers no easy way for the executive to remove judges the administration opposes.

Leonard, an associate professor at Illinois State University who has researched democratic decline in democracies, said the Trump administration had taken cues from the examples set by authoritarians abroad.

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

Pointing to examples such as the advisor's persistent assertions of nearly limitless presidential authority, she noted: “They directly criticize the courts by repeating over and over that it is not a co-equal branch in the separation of powers.

“They continue to redefine the discussion by emphasizing their argument that the executive has more power than this judicial branch, which is not how separation powers work.”

The professor said: “Judges' sole safeguard is people’s belief in the legitimacy of their capacity to make those decisions. Personal intimidation on top of weakening institutional legitimacy may make judges think twice about judgments that go against the sitting government, which is, of course, highly concerning for judicial review 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 escalating dangers to judges in the US.

She highlighted a series of termed “pizza doxxings” this year, in which judges have received unsolicited food orders with the recipient listed as Daniel Anderl, the child of Judge Esther Salas, who was murdered at the residence in several years ago by a gunman targeting the judge.

“All understands what it means. ‘We know where you live. We’re coming for you,’” the professor said.

“US justices are guarded by the Secret Service and the Marshals Service. And those are both specialized police units that sit institutionally inside the federal agency. And Pam Bondi has been leading the attacks on justices.”

Government Goals

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