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The US President is not typically known for counsel, especially from foreign leaders who often attempt to praise and compliment the US president.

But, El Salvador's strongman president Bukele has followed a different strategy by calling on the Trump administration to emulate his actions in removing what he terms “corrupt judges.”

His appeal for the president to move against the American court system also received support from Trump allies, including an X post by former close Trump ally the billionaire, who has previously boosted Bukele's calls to impeach US judges.

Unprecedented Threats to Court Autonomy

Experts note that Bukele's latest intervention come at a time of unmatched dangers to court autonomy and specific justices in the US, and during a phase where the Trump administration is employing comparable authoritarian methods used by leaders in nations such as Turkey, Hungary, India, and his native the Central American country to undermine government oversight.

Bukele's social media statement recently was one more in a string of taunts and allegations he has leveled against the US's legal system, including a March assertion that the US was “experiencing a judicial coup,” and ridicule of a federal judge's order to halt removal operations sending suspected illegal immigrants to his country's harsh correctional facilities.

Criticism on Federal Judge

The Salvadoran's impeachment call was also issued during online attacks on the state's justice Karin Immergut by White House aide Miller, attorney general Bondi, Musk, and the president personally in a recent press gaggle.

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

Record of Attacking Justices

The advisor, Bondi, and Musk have a long record of attacking judges who have blocked presidential directives or otherwise impeded the government's policy goals. Before resuming office recently, Trump directed his followers against judges overseeing his civil and criminal trials, who were then deluged with threats and abuse.

Watchdog organizations, law enforcement agencies, and the justices have pointed to a heightened atmosphere of risks and intimidation in the period since he re-entered the presidency.

Increasing Risk Data

According to data collected by the US Marshals Service, in the current year through the third quarter, there were over five hundred incidents to 395 US justices, giving rise to 805 inquiries. 2025 has already eclipsed 2022, and last year, and is likely to top the previous year's record of over six hundred threats.

The threats are not only happening at the federal level. Data from the university's research project indicates that there have been at least fifty-nine cases of intimidation, harassment, stalking, or physical attacks directed against judges on the local level in 2025.

Expert Insights on Root Causes

Experts state that the intimidation are a result of the language coming from top government officials.

In spring, the watchdog group published a detailed report claiming that “malicious and reckless statements from White House allies and supporters align with rising aggressive posts on social media.” It recorded “a 54% rise in demands for impeachment and violent threats against judges across social media platforms from January to February of this year, the first full month of the president's term.”

Beirich, the founder of the organization, said: “Trump’s threats against judges have definitely driven online vitriol at judges and calls for ouster. Attacking the judiciary is one more step in the administration's advance towards strongman rule.”

International Strongman Tactics

That march towards authoritarianism has been well-trodden in recent years in multiple nations, including by the Salvadoran.

In several years ago, immediately after commencing a new term despite legal bans, the president's parliamentary loyalists voted to remove the country’s top prosecutor and five judges on the constitutional court. The judges, who had provoked his ire by ruling against coronavirus measures, were replaced by new appointees selected by the leader.

The action mirrored the Hungarian leader's overhaul of Hungary’s court system several years back; Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s judicial purges in 2019; and attempts at comparable actions in Israel and Poland.

Weakening Court Autonomy

Analysts explain that the intimidation and verbal assaults in the US can be seen as attempts to undermine court autonomy in a structure that provides no simple method for the executive to remove judges Trump opposes.

Leonard, an academic at Illinois State University who has studied authoritarian backsliding in democracies, said the Trump administration had learned from the models set by strongmen overseas.

“The government is looking around at these successes and failures. They know they’re not going to be able to enact any legislation that would undermine the courts,” she said.

Pointing to instances such as the advisor's persistent assertions of nearly limitless executive power, she noted: “They openly criticize the courts by stating repeatedly that it is not a co-equal branch in the separation of powers.

“They persist in reframe the discussion by emphasizing their claim that the president has more power than this other co-equal branch, which is not how separation powers work.”

The professor said: “Judges' sole safeguard is public trust in the legitimacy of their ability to make those decisions. Personal intimidation on top of eroding institutional legitimacy may make judges think twice about judgments that go against the sitting government, which is, of course, massively problematic for court oversight and for democracy.”

Coercion Methods

Scheppele, academic of social science and global studies at the Ivy League school, has written about the use of “autocratic legalism” by the such as the Hungarian and the Russian, and has spoken out about rising dangers to judges in the US.

She highlighted a wave of termed “harassment deliveries” recently, in which judges have received unsolicited food orders with the customer listed as Daniel Anderl, the son of Justice Salas, who was killed at the judge’s home in several years ago by a gunman targeting Salas.

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

“Federal judges are guarded by the Secret Service and the federal police. And those are both specialized police units that sit structurally inside the Department of Justice. And the former AG has been spearheading the attacks on justices.”

Administration Aims

Regarding the administration’s aims, Scheppele said that “removing a federal judge is highly not going to happen because it’s very difficult to do. {Right now|Currently