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The US President does not usually take guidance, especially from foreign leaders who frequently seek to flatter and compliment the US president.

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

The call for the president to move against the American court system also received support from Maga figures, including an X post by one-time close Trump ally the billionaire, who has previously boosted the Salvadoran's demands to impeach US judges.

Growing Risks to Court Autonomy

Analysts say that Bukele's latest 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 comparable strong-arm methods used by rulers in nations such as Türkiye, Hungary, the Asian nation, and Bukele's own El Salvador to undermine government oversight.

Bukele's social media call recently was one more in a string of taunts and allegations he has leveled against the US's legal system, such as a spring assertion that the US was “facing a court takeover,” and ridicule of a federal judge's order to halt removal operations transporting accused illegal immigrants to his country's harsh correctional facilities.

Attacks on Oregon Justice

Bukele's demand for removal was also made during social media attacks on Oregon federal judge Judge Immergut by presidential advisor Miller, former AG Pam Bondi, Musk, and Trump himself in a recent press gaggle.

Immergut had issued restraining orders preventing the administration from mobilizing the military reserves, first in Oregon then in California. The president has been pushing to dispatch soldiers into the city, which the president has described as “battle-scarred” based on small, peaceful protests outside the urban homeland security facility.

History of Attacking Justices

Miller, the former AG, and the entrepreneur have a long record of attacking judges who have ruled against Trump's executive orders or in other ways hindered the administration's policy goals. Before resuming office this year, the president urged his followers against judges presiding over his civil and criminal trials, who were then inundated with intimidation and harassment.

Watchdog organizations, law enforcement agencies, and judges themselves have pointed to a increased climate of risks and coercion in the months since he re-entered the White House.

Increasing Risk Data

According to data gathered by the federal agency, in the current year through the end of September, there were 562 threats to 395 US justices, giving rise to more than eight hundred inquiries. This year has already eclipsed the first recorded year, and 2024, and is on track to exceed the previous year's record of 630 reported incidents.

The dangers are not just happening at the federal level. Data from the university's research project shows that there have been at least 59 instances of intimidation, harassment, surveillance, or violence committed against judges on the state and municipal levels in the current year.

Expert Analysis on Root Causes

Specialists state that the intimidation are a result of the rhetoric coming from top government officials.

In spring, the Global Project Against Hate and Extremism (GPAHE) published a detailed report claiming that “harmful and highly irresponsible statements from White House allies and allies coincide with rising aggressive posts on online platforms.” It noted “a 54% increase in calls for removal and violent threats against judges across social media platforms from the first two months 2025, the initial period of Trump’s administration.”

Heidi Beirich, the co-founder of the organization, said: “The president's threats against judges have certainly driven digital abuse at judges and calls for ouster. Targeting the courts is one more step in the administration's advance towards authoritarianism.”

Global Authoritarian Tactics

That march towards autocracy has been well-trodden in recent years in multiple nations, such as by Bukele.

In several years ago, right after commencing a second term despite constitutional prohibitions, Bukele’s allies in congress voted to dismiss the country’s top prosecutor and several judges on the constitutional court. The judges, who had provoked his ire by rejecting coronavirus measures, made way for new appointees hand picked by the leader.

The action mirrored the Hungarian leader's overhaul of the nation's judiciary in 2018; Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s judicial purges recently; and efforts at comparable actions in the Middle Eastern state and the European country.

Undermining Judicial Independence

Experts explain that the threats and rhetorical attacks in the US can be viewed as attempts to weaken court autonomy in a structure that offers no easy way for the president to dismiss judges Trump disapproves of.

Meghan Leonard, an academic at the university who has studied authoritarian backsliding in democracies, said the White House had learned from the models set by strongmen abroad.

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

Citing instances such as Miller’s relentless claims of nearly limitless presidential authority, she added: “They directly attack the courts by repeating over and over that it is not a co-equal branch in the separation of powers.

“They persist in redefine the discussion by emphasizing their claim that the executive has more power than this other co-equal branch, which is not how separation powers work.”

Leonard said: “Justices' sole safeguard is people’s belief in the legitimacy of their ability to make those rulings. Individual threats on top of weakening trust in courts may make judges think twice about decisions that go against the sitting government, which is, of course, massively problematic for judicial review and for the political system.”

Coercion Methods

Kim Lane Scheppele, academic of sociology and global studies at the Ivy League school, has written about the use of “autocratic legalism” by the such as the Hungarian and Putin, and has warned about escalating dangers to judges in the US.

She highlighted a wave of so-called “pizza doxxings” recently, in which judges have received unsolicited pizza deliveries with the customer listed as Daniel Anderl, the child of Judge Esther Salas, who was killed at the judge’s home in 2020 by a assailant aiming at Salas.

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

“US justices are guarded by the presidential protection and the federal police. And those are both dedicated police units that are placed institutionally inside the Department of Justice. And Pam Bondi has been spearheading the attacks on federal judges.”

Administration Aims

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