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Donald Trump rarely accepts guidance, especially from foreign leaders who often attempt to flatter and admire the US president.

However, the Central American nation's strongman president Bukele has followed a distinct strategy by urging the White House to follow his example in removing what he terms “corrupt judges.”

His appeal for the president to move against the US judiciary also garnered support from Maga figures, including an X post by former supporter Elon Musk, who has previously boosted Bukele's demands to impeach US judges.

Growing Risks to Judicial Independence

Analysts note that Bukele's recent remarks occur of unmatched dangers to judicial independence and specific justices in the US, and during a period where the president's team is using similar authoritarian methods used by rulers in nations such as Türkiye, the European state, the Asian nation, and his native the Central American country to undermine government oversight.

Bukele's online call last week was just the latest in a long series of provocations and allegations he has made against the American judiciary, including a March assertion that the US was “facing a judicial coup,” and his mockery of a court's ruling 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 criticism on Oregon justice Judge Immergut by White House aide Miller, attorney general Bondi, Musk, and Trump himself in a latest media briefing.

Immergut had issued restraining orders blocking Trump from mobilizing the military reserves, initially in Oregon then in California. The president has been eager to send troops into the city, which the president has characterized as “battle-scarred” based on limited, peaceful protests outside the city's federal building.

Record of Attacking Judges

The advisor, Bondi, and Musk have a long record of attacking judges who have ruled against Trump's executive orders or in other ways impeded the administration's political agenda. Prior to returning to power this year, Trump directed his supporters against judges presiding over his civil and criminal trials, who were then deluged with intimidation and harassment.

Watchdog organizations, law enforcement agencies, and the justices have pointed to a increased atmosphere of threats and coercion in the months since he returned to the White House.

Rising Risk Data

According to information collected by the US Marshals Service, in the current year through the end of September, there were over five hundred threats to nearly four hundred federal judges, leading to 805 inquiries. This year has already surpassed the first recorded year, and last year, and is likely to exceed the previous year's high of 630 reported incidents.

The dangers are not only happening at the national level. Information by Princeton's research project shows that there have been at least fifty-nine cases of intimidation, targeting, surveillance, or violence committed against judges on the local level in 2025.

Expert Analysis on Root Causes

Specialists state that the threats are a result of the language coming from top government officials.

In spring, the Global Project Against Hate and Extremism (GPAHE) published a comprehensive report claiming that “harmful and reckless statements from Trump administration members and allies coincide with escalating aggressive posts on online platforms.” It recorded “a fifty-four percent increase in calls for impeachment and physical intimidation against judges across social media platforms from the first two months 2025, the first full month of Trump’s administration.”

Heidi Beirich, the founder of GPAHE, said: “The president's warnings against judges have certainly fueled online vitriol at judges and demands for ouster. Targeting the courts is one more step in the administration's advance towards authoritarianism.”

Global Strongman Playbook

This progression towards authoritarianism has been common in recent years in multiple countries, such as by the Salvadoran.

In 2021, right after starting a second term despite constitutional prohibitions, the president's allies in congress voted to remove the nation's top prosecutor and five judges on the supreme court. The justices, who had provoked his ire by ruling against coronavirus measures, were replaced by replacements hand picked by Bukele.

The action mirrored the Hungarian leader's remodeling of Hungary’s court system several years back; the Turkish president's judicial purges recently; and efforts at comparable actions in the Middle Eastern state and Poland.

Weakening Court Autonomy

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

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

“The government 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 examples such as the advisor's relentless claims of broad presidential authority, she noted: “They directly attack the courts by repeating repeatedly that it is not a equal branch in the separation of powers.

“They persist in redefine the discussion by emphasizing their argument 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 authority of their capacity to make those rulings. Personal intimidation on top of eroding trust in courts may make judges hesitate about judgments that go against the sitting government, which is, of course, highly concerning for court oversight and for the political system.”

Intimidation Tactics

Kim Lane Scheppele, academic of sociology and international affairs at the Ivy League school, has documented the use of “authoritarian law” by the such as the Hungarian and Putin, and has spoken out about escalating threats to judges in the US.

She pointed to a wave of so-called “harassment deliveries” this year, in which judges have received unsolicited pizza deliveries with the customer listed as Daniel Anderl, the son of Justice Salas, who was murdered at the judge’s home in several years ago by a gunman targeting Salas.

“All understands what it means. ‘We know where you live. We’re coming for you,’” the professor said.

“Federal judges are protected by the presidential protection and the Marshals Service. And those are both dedicated law enforcement that sit institutionally inside the federal agency. And the former AG has been spearheading the criticism on federal judges.”

Administration Aims

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