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The US President is not typically known for guidance, particularly from international figures who frequently attempt to flatter and admire the US president.

However, the Central American nation's strongman president Nayib Bukele has followed a distinct approach by urging the White House to emulate his actions in removing so-called “corrupt judges.”

His appeal for Trump to take action against the US judiciary also received backing from Trump allies, such as an social media message by one-time close Trump ally the billionaire, who has in the past boosted the Salvadoran's demands to impeach US judges.

Growing Risks to Judicial Independence

Analysts say that the leader's recent intervention come at a time of unmatched dangers to judicial independence and specific justices in the United States, and during a phase where the president's team is employing comparable authoritarian tactics used by leaders in countries such as Türkiye, Hungary, India, and Bukele's own the Central American country to weaken democratic accountability.

Bukele's social media statement last week was one more in a string of provocations and claims he has leveled against the US's legal system, such as a March assertion that the US was “facing a judicial coup,” and ridicule of a federal judge's order to stop deportation flights sending accused illegal immigrants to his nation's harsh correctional facilities.

Attacks on Federal Judge

Bukele's demand for removal was also issued amid social media criticism on Oregon justice Karin Immergut by White House aide Miller, attorney general Pam Bondi, Elon Musk, and Trump personally in a latest press gaggle.

The judge had issued restraining orders preventing the administration from deploying the national guard, first in Oregon then in the West Coast state. The president has been pushing to dispatch troops into Portland, which the president has characterized as “battle-scarred” based on limited, non-violent protests outside the city's homeland security facility.

Record of Attacking Judges

The advisor, the former AG, and the entrepreneur have a history of attacking judges who have blocked Trump's executive orders or in other ways hindered the administration's policy goals. Prior to returning to power this year, the president directed his supporters 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 heightened atmosphere of risks and intimidation in the period since he returned to the presidency.

Rising Risk Data

According to data collected by the federal agency, in 2025 through the third quarter, there were 562 incidents to nearly four hundred federal judges, leading to 805 inquiries. This year has already eclipsed 2022, and last year, and is on track to exceed 2023's high of over six hundred threats.

The threats are not just happening at the federal level. Information by Princeton's research project shows that there have been at least fifty-nine cases of intimidation, harassment, surveillance, or physical attacks directed against judges on the local level in 2025.

Expert Insights on Root Causes

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

In May, the Global Project Against Hate and Extremism (GPAHE) published a comprehensive report claiming that “harmful and reckless statements from Trump administration members and supporters align with rising violent posts on social media.” It noted “a fifty-four percent rise in demands for removal and physical intimidation against judges across social media platforms from January to February of this year, the initial period of the president's term.”

Beirich, the founder of GPAHE, said: “Trump’s warnings against judges have certainly fueled digital abuse at judges and demands for ouster. Attacking the courts is one more step in the administration's march towards strongman rule.”

Global Authoritarian Tactics

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

In several years ago, right after starting a new term in the face of constitutional prohibitions, Bukele’s parliamentary loyalists voted to remove the country’s attorney general and five judges on the constitutional court. The justices, who had angered him by ruling against pandemic policies, were replaced by replacements hand picked by the leader.

The move mirrored Viktor Orbán’s remodeling of the nation's judiciary several years back; Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s court cleanups in 2019; and efforts at similar moves in Israel and the European country.

Weakening Judicial Independence

Experts explain that the intimidation and verbal assaults in the US can be viewed as attempts to undermine court autonomy 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 researched authoritarian backsliding in free nations, said the Trump administration had taken cues from the examples set by authoritarians overseas.

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

Pointing to instances such as Miller’s persistent claims of nearly limitless presidential authority, she added: “They openly attack the courts by repeating over and over that it is not a co-equal branch in the government structure.

“They persist in redefine the discussion by emphasizing their argument that the president has more power than this other co-equal branch, which is not how checks and balances work.”

The professor said: “Justices' only protection is public trust in the authority of their ability to make those rulings. Individual threats on top of eroding institutional legitimacy may make judges hesitate about decisions that go against the current administration, which is, of course, highly concerning for judicial review and for the political system.”

Intimidation Tactics

Kim Lane Scheppele, academic of social science and international affairs at Princeton University, has documented the use of “autocratic legalism” by the likes of the Hungarian and Putin, and has spoken out about rising dangers to judges in the US.

She pointed to a wave of termed “pizza doxxings” recently, in which judges have received unsolicited food orders with the recipient listed as Daniel Anderl, the son of Judge Esther Salas, who was murdered at the judge’s home in several years ago by a gunman aiming at the judge.

“All knows what it means. ‘Your address is known. We’re coming for you,’” Scheppele said.

“US justices are guarded by the Secret Service and the Marshals Service. And these are specialized law enforcement that sit structurally inside the federal agency. And the former AG has been leading the attacks on justices.”

Administration Aims

On the government's objectives, Scheppele said that “impeaching a federal judge is almost certainly not going to happen because it’s very difficult to do. {Right now|Currently