🔗 Share this article

Donald Trump rarely accepts guidance, especially from international figures who often attempt to flatter and admire the American leader.

But, the Central American nation's strongman president Nayib Bukele has adopted a different strategy by calling on the White House to follow his example in removing what he terms “dishonest judges.”

His appeal for the president to take action against the American court system also garnered support from Maga figures, including an X post by former supporter the billionaire, who has previously boosted the Salvadoran's demands to oust US judges.

Growing Risks to Judicial Independence

Analysts say that the leader's recent intervention come at a time of unmatched dangers to court autonomy and specific justices in the United States, and during a period where the Trump administration is employing comparable authoritarian tactics used by leaders in countries such as Turkey, Hungary, India, and his native the Central American country to undermine democratic accountability.

Bukele's social media statement last week was one more in a string of taunts and claims he has made against the US's legal system, such as a spring claim that the US was “experiencing a judicial coup,” and his mockery of a court's order to halt deportation flights transporting suspected illegal immigrants to his country's brutal prison system.

Criticism on Oregon Justice

Bukele's demand for removal was also issued during online criticism on the state's justice Judge Immergut by White House aide Miller, former AG Pam Bondi, Musk, and Trump personally in a latest media briefing.

The judge had ordered injunctions preventing the administration from mobilizing the national guard, initially in Oregon then in California. Trump has been pushing to dispatch soldiers into Portland, which the president has characterized as “war-ravaged” based on small, non-violent protests outside the city's federal building.

History of Attacking Judges

Miller, the former AG, and Musk have a long record of criticizing judges who have ruled against presidential directives or otherwise hindered the government's political agenda. Before resuming office recently, Trump urged his supporters against judges overseeing his legal cases, who were then inundated with threats and harassment.

Watchdog organizations, law enforcement agencies, and judges themselves have highlighted a increased atmosphere of threats and intimidation in the months since he returned to the presidency.

Increasing Risk Data

According to information collected by the US Marshals Service, in 2025 through the end of September, there were over five hundred incidents to 395 federal judges, leading to more than eight hundred investigations. 2025 has already eclipsed 2022, and last year, and is likely to top the previous year's record of 630 threats.

The threats are not just happening at the national level. Information by Princeton's research project shows that there have been at least 59 instances of intimidation, harassment, stalking, or violence directed against judges on the state and municipal levels in 2025.

Analyst Analysis on Threat Sources

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

In May, the watchdog group published a detailed report alleging that “harmful and reckless statements from Trump administration members and supporters align with rising violent posts on online platforms.” It recorded “a 54% rise in calls for removal and violent threats against judges across social media platforms from January to February of this year, the first full month of the president's term.”

Beirich, the co-founder of GPAHE, said: “The president's threats against judges have certainly driven online vitriol at judges and demands for impeachment. Targeting the courts is another move in Trump’s advance towards strongman rule.”

Global Strongman Playbook

This progression towards authoritarianism has been well-trodden in recent years in several countries, including by Bukele.

In 2021, immediately after commencing a new term despite legal bans, the president's allies in congress voted to remove the nation's top prosecutor and five justices on the constitutional court. The justices, who had angered him by rejecting pandemic policies, made way for replacements selected by the leader.

The action echoed the Hungarian leader's overhaul of Hungary’s court system in 2018; the Turkish president's court cleanups in 2019; and efforts at similar moves in Israel and the European country.

Undermining Judicial Independence

Experts explain that the intimidation and rhetorical attacks 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 Trump disapproves of.

Leonard, an associate professor at Illinois State University who has researched democratic decline in democracies, said the White House had learned from the models set by authoritarians abroad.

“The government is looking around at these achievements and failures. They know they’re not going to be able to enact any laws that would weaken the courts,” she said.

Pointing to examples such as the advisor's persistent claims of nearly limitless presidential authority, she added: “They directly criticize the courts by repeating repeatedly that it is not a co-equal branch in the separation of powers.

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

Leonard said: “Judges' only protection is public trust in the legitimacy of their ability to make those decisions. Personal intimidation on top of eroding trust in courts may make judges hesitate about judgments that go against the current administration, which is, of course, highly concerning for judicial review and for the political system.”

Intimidation Tactics

Scheppele, professor of social science and international affairs at Princeton University, has documented the use of “autocratic legalism” by the such as Orbán and Putin, and has spoken out about rising threats to judges in the US.

She highlighted a series of so-called “pizza doxxings” this year, in which judges have received unwanted 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 assailant targeting Salas.

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

“Federal judges are protected by the presidential protection and the federal police. And those are both specialized law enforcement that are placed structurally inside the Department of Justice. And Pam Bondi has been spearheading the criticism on justices.”

Government Goals

Regarding the administration’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