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Donald Trump does not usually take advice, particularly from foreign leaders who frequently attempt to praise and admire the US president.

However, the Central American nation's strongman president Bukele has adopted a different approach by calling on the White House to emulate his actions in removing so-called “corrupt judges.”

The call for the president to take action against the US judiciary also received support from Maga figures, such as an social media message by one-time close Trump ally the billionaire, who has in the past amplified the Salvadoran's demands to oust US judges.

Unprecedented Threats to Court Autonomy

Experts say that the leader's recent intervention come at a time of unmatched threats to judicial independence and individual judges in the United States, and during a period where the president's team is employing comparable authoritarian methods used by leaders in countries such as Turkey, Hungary, India, and Bukele's own the Central American country to undermine government oversight.

Bukele's social media statement last week was one more in a string of taunts and allegations he has leveled 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 stop deportation flights transporting suspected undocumented individuals to his country's brutal prison system.

Criticism on Oregon Justice

Bukele's impeachment call was also issued amid social media attacks on the state's justice Judge Immergut by presidential advisor Stephen Miller, former AG Pam Bondi, Elon Musk, and the president personally in a recent media briefing.

The judge had issued restraining orders preventing Trump from deploying the national guard, first in Oregon then in the West Coast state. Trump has been eager to send soldiers into the city, which the president has characterized as “war-ravaged” based on limited, peaceful protests outside the city's federal building.

Record of Targeting Judges

Miller, the former AG, and Musk have a history of criticizing judges who have ruled against Trump's executive orders or otherwise impeded the administration's political agenda. Prior to returning to power this year, Trump urged his supporters against judges overseeing his civil and criminal trials, who were then deluged with threats and harassment.

Watchdog organizations, police departments, and the justices have pointed to a heightened climate of threats and intimidation in the period since he re-entered the White House.

Rising Risk Data

Based on information gathered by the federal agency, in the current year through the end of September, there were over five hundred incidents to nearly four hundred US justices, giving rise to more than eight hundred investigations. 2025 has already surpassed 2022, and last year, and is likely to exceed 2023's record 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 fifty-nine instances of threats, targeting, stalking, or physical attacks committed against judges on the state and municipal levels in the current year.

Expert Analysis on Root Causes

Experts state that the intimidation are a product of the rhetoric coming from top government officials.

In spring, the Global Project Against Hate and Extremism (GPAHE) published a detailed report alleging that “malicious and reckless statements from White House allies and allies align with escalating aggressive posts on social media.” It recorded “a 54% rise in demands for removal and physical intimidation against judges across digital networks from January to February of this year, the first full month of Trump’s administration.”

Beirich, the co-founder of GPAHE, said: “Trump’s warnings against judges have certainly fueled digital abuse at judges and demands for ouster. Targeting the judiciary is another move in the administration's march towards strongman rule.”

International Strongman Playbook

That march towards autocracy has been well-trodden in the past decade in multiple countries, such as by Bukele.

In several years ago, immediately after commencing a new term despite constitutional prohibitions, Bukele’s parliamentary loyalists voted to dismiss the country’s attorney general and five judges on the constitutional court. The judges, who had angered him by rejecting coronavirus measures, were replaced by new appointees selected by Bukele.

The action mirrored the Hungarian leader's overhaul of Hungary’s court system in 2018; the Turkish president's judicial purges recently; and attempts at similar moves in the Middle Eastern state and Poland.

Undermining Judicial Independence

Experts say that the intimidation and rhetorical attacks in the US can be viewed as efforts to undermine court autonomy in a structure that provides no simple method for the president to remove judges Trump opposes.

Meghan Leonard, an associate professor at the university who has studied authoritarian backsliding in democracies, said the Trump administration had learned from the models set by strongmen abroad.

“The administration is looking around at these successes and failures. They know they’re not going to be able to pass any laws that would weaken the judiciary,” she said.

Citing examples such as the advisor's relentless claims of broad presidential authority, she noted: “They openly criticize the courts by repeating repeatedly that it is not a 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' sole safeguard is people’s belief in the authority of their ability to make those decisions. Individual threats on top of eroding trust in courts may make judges think twice about judgments that go against the current administration, which is, of course, highly concerning for court oversight and for democracy.”

Coercion Methods

Scheppele, professor of sociology and international affairs at the Ivy League school, has written about the use of “autocratic legalism” by the such as Orbán and the Russian, and has spoken out about escalating threats to judges in the US.

She highlighted a wave of termed “pizza doxxings” this year, in which judges have received unsolicited food orders with the customer listed as Daniel Anderl, the child of Justice Salas, who was killed at the judge’s home in 2020 by a gunman targeting Salas.

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

“US justices are guarded by the presidential protection and the federal police. And those are both specialized law enforcement that are placed institutionally inside the Department of Justice. And Pam Bondi has been leading the attacks on federal judges.”

Government Goals

Regarding the administration’s objectives, Scheppele said that “removing a US justice is highly not going to happen because it’s so hard to do. {Right now|Currently