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The US President rarely accepts guidance, particularly from international figures who frequently attempt to flatter and admire the US president.

But, El Salvador's strongman president Nayib Bukele has followed a different approach by urging the White House to emulate his actions in impeaching so-called “corrupt judges.”

His appeal for the president to take action against the US judiciary also received backing from Maga figures, such as an X post by former supporter the billionaire, who has previously amplified the Salvadoran's demands to oust US judges.

Unprecedented Risks to Court Autonomy

Experts say that the leader's recent remarks come at a time of unmatched dangers to judicial independence and individual judges in the United States, and during a period where the president's team is employing similar strong-arm methods used by leaders in nations such as Türkiye, Hungary, India, and his native the Central American country to weaken government oversight.

Bukele's social media call recently was just the latest in a long series of provocations and claims he has made against the US's legal system, including a March assertion that the US was “facing a judicial coup,” and ridicule of a federal judge's ruling to halt deportation flights transporting accused illegal immigrants to his nation's brutal correctional facilities.

Attacks on Federal Judge

The Salvadoran's demand for removal was also issued during online attacks on the state's justice Karin Immergut by presidential advisor Stephen Miller, former AG Bondi, Musk, and the president himself in a latest press gaggle.

Immergut had ordered restraining orders blocking Trump from deploying the national guard, initially in the state then in the West Coast state. The president has been eager to dispatch troops into Portland, which the president has characterized as “battle-scarred” based on small, non-violent protests outside the urban federal building.

History of Attacking Judges

The advisor, the former AG, and Musk have a long record of criticizing judges who have blocked Trump's executive orders or in other ways impeded the government's policy goals. Before resuming office this year, the president directed his followers against judges presiding over his civil and criminal trials, who were then deluged with threats and harassment.

Watchdog organizations, law enforcement agencies, and the justices have highlighted a heightened atmosphere of risks and intimidation in the period since he returned to the White House.

Increasing Risk Data

Based on data gathered by the federal agency, in the current year through the third quarter, there were 562 incidents to nearly four hundred federal judges, giving rise to 805 investigations. This year has already surpassed 2022, and last year, and is on track to exceed the previous year's record of 630 reported incidents.

The dangers are not just happening at the federal level. Information by Princeton's Bridging Divides Initiative indicates that there have been at least fifty-nine instances of threats, harassment, surveillance, or violence committed against judges on the local level in 2025.

Analyst Analysis on Threat Sources

Specialists state that the threats are a product of the rhetoric coming from top government officials.

In spring, the watchdog group published a detailed report alleging that “malicious and highly irresponsible statements from White House allies and allies align with escalating aggressive posts on online platforms.” It noted “a 54% rise in demands for removal and physical intimidation against judges across social media platforms from January to February 2025, the initial period of the president's term.”

Beirich, the co-founder of the organization, said: “Trump’s warnings against judges have certainly driven online vitriol at judges and demands for ouster. Targeting the judiciary is one more step in the administration's advance towards authoritarianism.”

International Strongman Tactics

This progression towards autocracy has been well-trodden in the past decade in several nations, including by the Salvadoran.

In 2021, right after commencing a second term despite legal bans, Bukele’s parliamentary loyalists voted to remove the nation's top prosecutor and several justices on the constitutional court. The justices, who had angered him by ruling against pandemic policies, made way for replacements hand picked by Bukele.

The move echoed the Hungarian leader's remodeling of Hungary’s court system in 2018; the Turkish president's judicial purges recently; and efforts at comparable actions in the Middle Eastern state and Poland.

Undermining Judicial Independence

Analysts explain that the intimidation and verbal assaults in the US can be seen as attempts to undermine judicial independence in a system that provides no simple method for the president to dismiss judges the administration disapproves of.

Meghan Leonard, an associate professor at the university who has studied democratic decline in democracies, said the Trump administration had taken cues from the models set by authoritarians abroad.

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

Citing examples such as the advisor's relentless assertions of nearly limitless executive power, she noted: “They openly attack the judiciary by stating repeatedly that it is not a co-equal branch in the government structure.

“They continue to reframe the discussion by repeating their argument that the executive has greater authority than this other co-equal branch, which is not how checks and balances work.”

Leonard said: “Justices' sole safeguard is public trust in the authority of their capacity to make those rulings. Individual threats on top of eroding institutional legitimacy may make judges think twice about judgments that go against the sitting government, which is, of course, highly concerning for court oversight and for democracy.”

Coercion Methods

Scheppele, academic of sociology and global studies at the Ivy League school, has written about the use of “autocratic legalism” by the such as Orbán and Putin, and has warned about rising threats to judges in the US.

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

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

“US justices are guarded by the presidential protection and the Marshals Service. And those are both dedicated law enforcement that are placed structurally inside the federal agency. And the former AG has been leading the criticism 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