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Donald Trump rarely accepts advice, particularly from foreign leaders who frequently seek to flatter and admire the American leader.

However, El Salvador's authoritarian leader Nayib Bukele has followed a different strategy by calling on the White House to follow his example in removing so-called “corrupt judges.”

The call for the president to take action against the US judiciary also garnered backing from Maga figures, such as an social media message by one-time close Trump ally the billionaire, who has in the past boosted the Salvadoran's demands to impeach US judges.

Growing Threats to Court Autonomy

Analysts note that the leader's latest intervention occur of unmatched dangers to judicial independence and individual judges in the US, and during a period where the president's team is using comparable strong-arm methods employed by leaders in countries such as Türkiye, the European state, the Asian nation, and his native the Central American country to weaken government oversight.

Bukele's online statement last week was one more in a string of provocations and allegations he has leveled against the US's legal system, such as a spring assertion that the US was “experiencing a court takeover,” and his mockery of a federal judge's ruling to halt deportation flights sending accused undocumented individuals to his country's brutal correctional facilities.

Attacks on Federal Judge

Bukele's demand for removal was also issued during social media criticism on the state's federal judge Karin Immergut by White House aide Miller, attorney general Pam Bondi, Elon Musk, and the president himself in a latest press gaggle.

Immergut had ordered restraining orders preventing Trump from deploying the military reserves, first in the state then in the West Coast state. The president has been eager to send soldiers into the city, which the president has described as “war-ravaged” based on small, peaceful protests outside the urban federal building.

History of Targeting Judges

Miller, Bondi, and Musk have a history of criticizing judges who have blocked presidential directives or in other ways hindered the administration's political agenda. Before resuming office recently, Trump directed his followers against judges presiding over his legal cases, who were then deluged with threats and abuse.

Watchdog organizations, law enforcement agencies, and the justices have highlighted a increased climate of threats and coercion in the period since he returned to the White House.

Increasing Risk Data

According to data collected by the US Marshals Service, in the current year through the end of September, there were 562 threats to 395 federal judges, giving rise to 805 inquiries. 2025 has already eclipsed 2022, and 2024, and is on track to top 2023's record of over six hundred threats.

The threats are not just happening at the federal level. Information by the university's research project shows that there have been at least 59 cases of intimidation, targeting, stalking, or violence committed against judges on the state and municipal levels in 2025.

Analyst Analysis on Threat Sources

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

In May, the watchdog group published a comprehensive report alleging that “malicious and reckless statements from Trump administration members and allies coincide with rising aggressive posts on social media.” It noted “a 54% increase in demands for impeachment and physical intimidation against judges across digital networks from the first two months 2025, the initial period of Trump’s administration.”

Heidi Beirich, the founder of the organization, said: “Trump’s warnings against judges have certainly fueled online vitriol at judges and demands for impeachment. Attacking the judiciary is another move in the administration's advance towards strongman rule.”

Global Authoritarian Playbook

That march towards autocracy has been common in the past decade in multiple nations, such as by the Salvadoran.

In several years ago, immediately after starting a new term despite constitutional prohibitions, Bukele’s allies in congress voted to remove the nation's top prosecutor and five justices on the constitutional court. The judges, who had angered him by rejecting pandemic policies, were replaced by new appointees selected by the leader.

The move echoed Viktor Orbán’s remodeling of Hungary’s court system several years back; the Turkish president's judicial purges recently; and efforts at comparable actions in Israel and Poland.

Weakening Judicial Independence

Analysts explain that the intimidation and verbal assaults in the US can be viewed as efforts to undermine court autonomy in a structure that offers no easy way for the president to remove judges Trump disapproves of.

Meghan Leonard, an associate professor at the university who has studied democratic decline in free nations, said the White House had learned from the examples set by authoritarians overseas.

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

Pointing to examples such as the advisor's persistent assertions of nearly limitless executive power, she added: “They openly criticize the courts by stating repeatedly that it is not a equal branch in the government structure.

“They persist in redefine the discussion by emphasizing their argument that the president has more power than this other co-equal branch, which is not how checks and balances work.”

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

Coercion Methods

Scheppele, professor of sociology and global studies at Princeton University, has documented the use of “autocratic legalism” by the likes of Orbán and Putin, and has warned about escalating dangers to judges in the US.

She pointed to a wave of termed “pizza doxxings” this year, in which judges have received unsolicited food orders with the recipient listed as Daniel Anderl, the son of Justice Salas, who was killed at the residence in 2020 by a assailant targeting Salas.

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

“US justices are protected by the presidential protection and the Marshals Service. And those are both dedicated police units that are placed institutionally inside the federal agency. And the former AG has been leading the criticism on federal judges.”

Government Goals

On the government's objectives, Scheppele said that “impeaching a US justice is almost certainly not going to happen because it’s so hard to do. {Right now|Currently