🔗 Share this article

The US President does not usually take advice, especially from international figures who often seek to praise and admire the US president.

However, the Central American nation's strongman president Bukele has followed a different approach by calling on the Trump administration to follow his example in removing so-called “corrupt judges.”

His appeal for the president to move against the US judiciary also garnered support from Trump allies, including an social media message by one-time supporter Elon Musk, who has in the past boosted Bukele's calls to impeach US judges.

Growing Risks to Judicial Independence

Experts say that the leader's latest intervention occur of unmatched threats to court autonomy and specific justices in the United States, and during a phase where the president's team is employing comparable strong-arm tactics used by leaders in countries such as Turkey, the European state, India, and his native 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 leveled against the American judiciary, such as a March assertion that the US was “facing a judicial coup,” and ridicule of a court's ruling to halt removal operations sending accused undocumented individuals to his country's harsh correctional facilities.

Criticism on Oregon Justice

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

Immergut had issued restraining orders blocking the administration from mobilizing the military reserves, first in Oregon then in the West Coast state. The president has been pushing to send soldiers into Portland, which the leader has characterized as “war-ravaged” based on small, non-violent protests outside the urban homeland security facility.

Record of Attacking Justices

Miller, Bondi, and Musk have a history of attacking judges who have blocked Trump's executive orders or otherwise impeded the administration's political agenda. Prior to returning to power recently, Trump urged his supporters against judges presiding over his civil and criminal trials, who were then deluged with threats and harassment.

Monitoring groups, law enforcement agencies, and judges themselves have pointed to a increased climate of risks and intimidation in the period since he returned to the White House.

Increasing Threat Statistics

Based on information gathered by the US Marshals Service, in the current year through the end of September, there were over five hundred incidents to 395 US justices, leading to more than eight hundred inquiries. This year has already surpassed the first recorded year, and 2024, and is on track to top 2023's record of 630 reported incidents.

The threats are not only happening at the federal level. Data from the university's Bridging Divides Initiative shows that there have been at least fifty-nine cases of intimidation, targeting, stalking, or violence committed against judges on the state and municipal levels in 2025.

Analyst Insights on Root Causes

Experts say that the threats are a result of the rhetoric coming from senior administration figures.

In spring, the Global Project Against Hate and Extremism (GPAHE) published a comprehensive report claiming that “malicious and reckless statements from White House allies and supporters coincide with rising violent posts on social media.” It noted “a 54% rise in calls for impeachment and physical intimidation against judges across social media platforms from the first two months 2025, the initial period of the president's term.”

Heidi Beirich, the founder of GPAHE, said: “The president's threats against judges have certainly driven digital abuse at judges and demands for impeachment. Attacking the courts is another move in Trump’s march towards strongman rule.”

Global Authoritarian Playbook

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

In several years ago, immediately after starting a second term despite legal bans, Bukele’s allies in congress voted to remove the country’s attorney general and five justices on the constitutional court. The justices, who had provoked his ire by rejecting pandemic policies, were replaced by replacements hand picked by the leader.

The action mirrored Viktor Orbán’s overhaul of Hungary’s court system in 2018; Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s court cleanups in 2019; and attempts at similar moves in Israel and the European country.

Weakening Court Autonomy

Experts say that the intimidation and verbal assaults in the US can be seen as efforts to undermine court autonomy in a system that provides no simple method for the executive to dismiss judges the administration opposes.

Meghan Leonard, an academic at the university who has researched democratic decline in free nations, said the Trump administration had learned from the examples set by strongmen overseas.

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

Pointing to examples such as Miller’s persistent assertions of nearly limitless executive power, she added: “They openly criticize the courts by repeating over and over that it is not a co-equal branch in the government structure.

“They continue to redefine the discussion by emphasizing their claim that the executive has greater authority than this other co-equal branch, which is not how checks and balances work.”

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

Coercion Methods

Kim Lane Scheppele, professor of social science and global studies at the Ivy League school, has documented the use of “autocratic legalism” 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 so-called “harassment deliveries” recently, in which judges have received unwanted food orders with the recipient listed as Daniel Anderl, the son of Judge Esther Salas, who was killed at the judge’s home in several years ago by a gunman targeting the judge.

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

“Federal judges are guarded by the presidential protection and the federal police. And these are specialized police units that sit institutionally inside the federal agency. And the former AG has been leading the criticism on justices.”

Administration Aims

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