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Donald Trump is not typically known for counsel, particularly from foreign leaders who often attempt to praise and admire the US president.

However, El Salvador's strongman president Nayib Bukele has adopted a distinct strategy by urging the White House to emulate his actions in removing what he terms “dishonest judges.”

His appeal for Trump to move against the US judiciary also received support from Maga figures, such as an X post by one-time close Trump ally Elon Musk, who has previously amplified the Salvadoran's demands to impeach US judges.

Unprecedented Risks to Judicial Independence

Analysts note that Bukele's latest intervention come at a time of unmatched dangers to court autonomy and individual judges in the United States, and during a period where the Trump administration is using comparable strong-arm tactics used by rulers in countries such as Türkiye, the European state, India, and Bukele's own El Salvador to undermine government oversight.

Bukele's social media statement recently was just the latest 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 his mockery of a court's order to halt removal operations sending suspected illegal immigrants to his country's brutal correctional facilities.

Attacks on Federal Judge

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

Immergut had issued restraining orders blocking the administration from mobilizing the military reserves, first in Oregon then in the West Coast state. The president has been eager to dispatch soldiers into Portland, which the leader has characterized as “war-ravaged” based on small, non-violent demonstrations outside the city's homeland security facility.

History of Attacking Justices

Miller, Bondi, and Musk have a history of criticizing judges who have blocked presidential directives or in other ways hindered the administration's policy goals. Before returning to power recently, the president directed his supporters against judges presiding over his civil and criminal trials, who were then inundated with threats and abuse.

Watchdog organizations, law enforcement agencies, and judges themselves have pointed to a increased climate of threats and coercion in the months since he returned to the presidency.

Increasing Risk Data

Based on information gathered by the US Marshals Service, in the current year through the end of September, there were over five hundred incidents to 395 US justices, leading to more than eight hundred inquiries. 2025 has already eclipsed 2022, and last year, and is on track to exceed the previous year's high of 630 reported incidents.

The dangers are not only happening at the national level. Data from the university's research project shows that there have been at least fifty-nine cases of intimidation, harassment, stalking, or physical attacks directed against judges on the state and municipal levels in the current year.

Analyst Insights on Threat Sources

Specialists say that the threats are a product of the language coming from top government officials.

In spring, the Global Project Against Hate and Extremism (GPAHE) published a detailed report alleging that “harmful and reckless statements from White House allies and allies align with escalating aggressive posts on online platforms.” It recorded “a 54% increase in calls for removal and physical intimidation against judges across digital networks from the first two months 2025, the initial period of Trump’s administration.”

Heidi Beirich, the co-founder of the organization, said: “The president's threats against judges have certainly fueled online vitriol at judges and demands for ouster. Targeting the courts is one more step in the administration's march towards strongman rule.”

International Authoritarian Playbook

That march towards autocracy has been well-trodden in recent years in several countries, such as by the Salvadoran.

In several years ago, immediately after commencing a second term despite legal bans, the president's parliamentary loyalists voted to dismiss the country’s attorney general and several justices on the supreme court. The justices, who had provoked his ire by ruling against coronavirus measures, made way for replacements selected by Bukele.

The move echoed Viktor Orbán’s remodeling of Hungary’s court system in 2018; Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s court cleanups in 2019; and efforts at comparable actions in the Middle Eastern state and Poland.

Weakening Court Autonomy

Analysts explain that the intimidation and verbal assaults in the US can be viewed as attempts to weaken judicial independence in a system that offers no easy way for the president to remove judges the administration disapproves of.

Leonard, an associate professor at Illinois State University who has studied authoritarian backsliding in democracies, said the White House had learned from the models set by authoritarians overseas.

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

Pointing to instances such as Miller’s relentless assertions of broad executive power, she added: “They openly criticize the judiciary by stating over and over that it is not a co-equal branch in the separation of powers.

“They persist in reframe the debate by emphasizing their claim that the executive has more power than this judicial branch, which is not how checks and balances work.”

The professor said: “Judges' sole safeguard is people’s belief in the legitimacy of their capacity to make those decisions. Individual threats on top of eroding institutional legitimacy may make judges think twice about judgments that go against the current administration, which is, of course, massively problematic for court oversight and for democracy.”

Coercion Methods

Kim Lane Scheppele, academic of sociology and international affairs at Princeton University, has documented the use of “autocratic legalism” by the such as Orbán and the Russian, and has spoken out about rising threats to judges in the US.

She highlighted a series of termed “harassment deliveries” recently, in which judges have received unwanted food orders with the recipient listed as Daniel Anderl, the child of Justice Salas, who was killed at the residence in several years ago by a assailant aiming at Salas.

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

“Federal judges are protected by the presidential protection and the Marshals Service. And these are dedicated law enforcement that are placed institutionally inside the federal agency. And the former AG has been leading the attacks on federal judges.”

Government Goals

On the government's aims, the expert said that “impeaching a US justice is highly not going to happen because it’s very difficult to do. {Right now|Currently