🔗 Share this article

Donald Trump is not typically known for guidance, especially from international figures who often attempt to praise and admire the American leader.

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

The call for the president to take action against the US judiciary also garnered support from Trump allies, including an social media message by one-time supporter the billionaire, who has previously amplified Bukele's calls to oust US judges.

Growing Risks to Court Autonomy

Experts note that Bukele's recent intervention occur of unprecedented threats to court autonomy and specific justices in the United States, and during a phase where the Trump administration is using comparable authoritarian tactics employed by leaders in nations such as Turkey, the European state, the Asian nation, and his native the Central American country to undermine democratic accountability.

The president's online statement last week was just the latest in a string of taunts and claims he has made against the American judiciary, such as a spring assertion that the US was “experiencing a judicial coup,” and ridicule of a federal judge's ruling to halt deportation flights transporting suspected illegal immigrants to his country's brutal correctional facilities.

Attacks on Oregon Justice

Bukele's demand for removal was also issued amid social media attacks on Oregon federal judge Judge Immergut by presidential advisor Miller, attorney general Bondi, Elon Musk, and Trump personally in a recent press gaggle.

Immergut had ordered restraining orders blocking Trump from deploying the military reserves, first in Oregon then in the West Coast state. The president has been eager to dispatch soldiers into the city, which the leader has described as “battle-scarred” based on limited, peaceful protests outside the city's homeland security facility.

Record of Targeting Judges

Miller, the former AG, and Musk have a history of attacking judges who have ruled against Trump's executive orders or in other ways impeded the administration's policy goals. Before returning to power this year, the president directed his followers against judges overseeing his civil and criminal trials, who were then deluged with intimidation and harassment.

Watchdog organizations, law enforcement agencies, and judges themselves have highlighted a heightened atmosphere of threats and coercion in the period since he returned to the presidency.

Increasing Threat Statistics

Based on information gathered by the US Marshals Service, in 2025 through the third quarter, there were 562 threats to nearly four hundred federal judges, leading to more than eight hundred inquiries. 2025 has already surpassed the first recorded year, and 2024, and is on track to exceed the previous year's record of over six hundred threats.

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

Analyst Analysis on Threat Sources

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

In spring, the watchdog group published a comprehensive report claiming that “malicious and highly irresponsible statements from Trump administration members and supporters align with rising violent posts on social media.” It noted “a fifty-four percent rise in calls for impeachment and violent threats against judges across digital networks from January to February 2025, the initial period of Trump’s administration.”

Beirich, the co-founder of GPAHE, said: “Trump’s threats against judges have definitely fueled online vitriol at judges and demands for ouster. Attacking the courts is another move in Trump’s advance towards authoritarianism.”

International Strongman Playbook

This progression towards authoritarianism has been common in the past decade in several countries, such as by the Salvadoran.

In 2021, immediately after commencing a new term in the face of legal bans, the president's allies in congress voted to dismiss the country’s top prosecutor and several judges on the supreme court. The judges, who had angered him by rejecting coronavirus measures, made way for new appointees selected by the leader.

The move echoed the Hungarian leader's remodeling of Hungary’s court system several years back; the Turkish president's court cleanups in 2019; and efforts at similar moves in Israel and Poland.

Undermining Court Autonomy

Experts explain that the threats and verbal assaults in the US can be seen as efforts to weaken judicial independence in a structure 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 authoritarian backsliding in free nations, said the Trump administration had learned from the examples set by strongmen overseas.

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

Pointing to instances such as Miller’s persistent assertions of broad executive power, she noted: “They directly attack the judiciary by repeating over and over that it is not a co-equal branch in the government structure.

“They persist in reframe the debate by emphasizing their argument that the president has greater authority than this other co-equal branch, which is not how separation powers work.”

Leonard said: “Justices' sole safeguard is public trust in the authority of their capacity to make those decisions. Personal intimidation on top of weakening institutional legitimacy may make judges think twice about decisions that go against the current administration, which is, of course, massively problematic for judicial review and for democracy.”

Coercion Methods

Scheppele, professor of social science and global studies at the Ivy League school, has documented 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 “pizza doxxings” this year, in which judges have received unsolicited food orders with the recipient listed as a name, the child of Justice Salas, who was killed at the judge’s home in several years ago by a gunman aiming at the judge.

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

“Federal judges are protected by the Secret Service and the federal police. And those are both specialized police units that sit institutionally inside the Department of Justice. And the former AG has been leading the criticism on federal judges.”

Administration Aims

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