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Donald Trump does not usually take counsel, especially from foreign leaders who frequently attempt to flatter and compliment the American leader.

But, the Central American nation's authoritarian leader Bukele has adopted a distinct approach by calling on the Trump administration to emulate his actions in removing so-called “dishonest judges.”

His appeal for Trump to take action against the US judiciary also garnered backing from Maga figures, including an social media message by former close Trump ally the billionaire, who has in the past boosted the Salvadoran's demands to oust US judges.

Unprecedented Threats to Court Autonomy

Experts say that Bukele's recent remarks come at a time of unmatched dangers to judicial independence and specific justices in the US, and during a period where the president's team is using comparable authoritarian methods employed by leaders in nations such as Turkey, the European state, the Asian nation, and his native the Central American country to weaken government oversight.

Bukele's social media statement recently was one more in a long series of taunts and claims he has leveled against the US's legal system, such as a March assertion that the US was “experiencing a court takeover,” and his mockery of a federal judge's ruling to stop removal operations sending accused undocumented individuals to his nation's harsh correctional facilities.

Criticism on Oregon Justice

The Salvadoran's impeachment call was also made amid online criticism on the state's federal judge Karin Immergut by presidential advisor Miller, former AG Pam Bondi, Elon Musk, and Trump personally in a recent press gaggle.

Immergut had ordered restraining orders blocking Trump from mobilizing the military reserves, first in Oregon then in the West Coast state. The president has been pushing to dispatch soldiers into Portland, which the leader has characterized as “war-ravaged” based on small, non-violent protests outside the urban homeland security facility.

Record of Targeting Justices

Miller, the former AG, and the entrepreneur have a history of criticizing judges who have blocked Trump's executive orders or otherwise impeded the government's political agenda. Prior to returning to power this year, Trump urged his supporters against judges presiding over his civil and criminal trials, who were then inundated with intimidation and harassment.

Monitoring groups, police departments, and the justices have pointed to a heightened atmosphere of risks and coercion in the months since he returned to the presidency.

Rising Threat Statistics

Based on information gathered by the US Marshals Service, in the current year through the third quarter, there were 562 threats to nearly four hundred US justices, leading to more than eight hundred inquiries. This year has already eclipsed the first recorded year, and last year, and is likely to top 2023's high of over six hundred reported incidents.

The threats are not only happening at the national level. Data from the university's Bridging Divides Initiative indicates that there have been at least 59 cases of threats, targeting, surveillance, or physical attacks committed against judges on the state and municipal levels in 2025.

Analyst Insights on Threat Sources

Specialists say that the intimidation are a result of the rhetoric 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 White House allies and supporters align with rising violent posts on social media.” It recorded “a fifty-four percent 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 the president's term.”

Heidi Beirich, the co-founder of GPAHE, said: “The president's threats against judges have certainly driven online vitriol at judges and demands for impeachment. Attacking the courts is another move in the administration's advance towards authoritarianism.”

International Authoritarian Tactics

That march towards authoritarianism has been common in recent years in several nations, such as by the Salvadoran.

In several years ago, immediately after starting a new term despite constitutional prohibitions, Bukele’s parliamentary loyalists voted to dismiss the country’s top prosecutor and several judges on the supreme court. The judges, who had provoked his ire by ruling against pandemic policies, made way for replacements hand picked by Bukele.

The move echoed the Hungarian leader's remodeling of the nation's judiciary in 2018; Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s court cleanups in 2019; and attempts at similar moves in Israel and Poland.

Undermining Court Autonomy

Experts say that the intimidation and verbal assaults in the US can be seen as efforts to weaken judicial independence in a structure that offers no easy way for the executive to remove judges Trump opposes.

Leonard, an associate professor at the university who has studied democratic decline in free nations, said the White House had taken cues 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 legislation that would undermine the judiciary,” she said.

Pointing to examples such as Miller’s relentless claims of broad executive power, she added: “They openly criticize the courts by repeating repeatedly that it is not a co-equal branch in the government structure.

“They continue to reframe the debate by emphasizing their argument that the president has greater authority than this judicial branch, which is not how separation powers work.”

Leonard said: “Justices' sole safeguard is people’s belief in the legitimacy of their ability to make those rulings. Individual threats on top of eroding trust in courts may make judges think twice about decisions that go against the current administration, which is, of course, massively problematic for court oversight and for the political system.”

Coercion Methods

Scheppele, academic of sociology and global studies at the Ivy League school, has written about the use of “autocratic legalism” by the likes of the Hungarian and the Russian, and has spoken out about escalating dangers to judges in the US.

She pointed to a wave of so-called “pizza doxxings” this year, in which judges have received unsolicited food orders with the recipient listed as a name, the son of Justice Salas, who was killed at the judge’s home in several years ago by a gunman targeting the judge.

“Everyone knows what it means. ‘We know where you live. You are a target,’” Scheppele said.

“US justices are protected by the Secret Service and the Marshals Service. And these are dedicated law enforcement that sit structurally inside the Department of Justice. And the former AG has been spearheading the attacks on justices.”

Administration Aims

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