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Donald Trump is not typically known for counsel, particularly from foreign leaders who often attempt to praise and compliment the American leader.

However, El Salvador's authoritarian leader Nayib Bukele has adopted a different approach by urging the Trump administration to follow his example in removing what he terms “corrupt judges.”

His appeal for Trump to take action against the US judiciary also garnered backing from Trump allies, including an social media message by former supporter Elon Musk, who has in the past amplified the Salvadoran's calls to oust US judges.

Growing Threats 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 Trump administration is employing similar strong-arm tactics employed by leaders in countries such as Türkiye, the European state, the Asian nation, and Bukele's own the Central American country to weaken democratic accountability.

Bukele's online call recently was just the latest in a long series of taunts and allegations he has made against the American judiciary, including a March assertion that the US was “facing a judicial coup,” and ridicule of a court's order to stop removal operations transporting accused undocumented individuals to his nation's brutal prison system.

Attacks on Federal Judge

Bukele's impeachment call was also made amid social media criticism on the state's justice Judge Immergut by White House aide Stephen Miller, former AG Bondi, Musk, and the president himself in a recent media briefing.

Immergut had ordered restraining orders blocking the administration from deploying the military reserves, initially in Oregon then in California. Trump has been eager to dispatch troops into Portland, which the leader has characterized as “war-ravaged” based on limited, non-violent demonstrations outside the urban federal building.

History of Attacking Judges

The advisor, Bondi, and Musk have a history of attacking judges who have ruled against presidential directives or in other ways impeded the government's political agenda. Prior to resuming office recently, the president directed his followers against judges presiding over his legal cases, who were then deluged with threats and harassment.

Watchdog organizations, police departments, and the justices have highlighted a increased atmosphere of threats and intimidation in the period since he re-entered the presidency.

Increasing Threat Statistics

According to information gathered by the federal agency, in the current year through the end of September, there were over five hundred incidents to 395 federal judges, leading to more than eight hundred investigations. 2025 has already eclipsed 2022, and 2024, and is on track to top the previous year's record of 630 threats.

The dangers are not just happening at the federal level. Information by Princeton's research project shows that there have been at least fifty-nine instances of threats, harassment, surveillance, or violence directed against judges on the state and municipal levels in 2025.

Expert Insights on Threat Sources

Experts 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 “malicious and reckless statements from Trump administration members and supporters align with rising aggressive posts on social media.” It recorded “a 54% increase in demands for impeachment and physical intimidation against judges across social media platforms from January to February 2025, the first full month of Trump’s administration.”

Heidi Beirich, the founder of GPAHE, said: “The president's warnings against judges have certainly driven online vitriol at judges and calls for ouster. Attacking the courts is one more step in Trump’s march towards strongman rule.”

Global Strongman Tactics

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

In several years ago, immediately after starting a second term in the face of legal bans, Bukele’s parliamentary loyalists voted to dismiss the country’s top prosecutor and several judges on the constitutional court. The judges, who had provoked his ire by ruling against pandemic policies, were replaced by replacements hand picked by Bukele.

The action echoed Viktor Orbán’s remodeling of Hungary’s court system several years back; Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s court cleanups recently; and attempts at similar moves in the Middle Eastern state and the European country.

Undermining Court Autonomy

Analysts explain that the threats and verbal assaults in the US can be seen as efforts to weaken court autonomy in a system that provides no simple method for the president to remove judges Trump opposes.

Meghan Leonard, an associate professor at Illinois State University who has researched democratic decline in free nations, said the Trump administration had learned from the models set by strongmen abroad.

“The administration is looking around at these successes and failures. They know they’re not going to be able to pass any laws that would weaken the courts,” she said.

Citing instances such as Miller’s relentless claims of broad presidential authority, she added: “They openly criticize the judiciary by repeating repeatedly that it is not a co-equal branch in the government structure.

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

Leonard said: “Judges' sole safeguard is public trust in the authority of their ability to make those decisions. Individual threats on top of weakening trust in courts may make judges hesitate about decisions that go against the current administration, which is, of course, highly concerning for court oversight and for the political system.”

Intimidation Tactics

Kim Lane Scheppele, academic of social science and global studies at Princeton University, has written about the use of “authoritarian law” by the likes of the Hungarian and the Russian, and has warned about escalating threats to judges in the US.

She highlighted a series of termed “harassment deliveries” this year, in which judges have received unsolicited pizza deliveries with the customer listed as a name, the child of Justice Salas, who was murdered at the residence in several years ago by a assailant targeting Salas.

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

“Federal judges are guarded by the Secret Service and the federal police. And those are both dedicated law enforcement that sit structurally inside the federal agency. And the former AG has been leading the attacks on federal judges.”

Government Goals

Regarding the administration’s aims, the expert said that “removing a US justice is almost certainly not going to happen because it’s so hard to do. {Right now|Currently