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The US President is not typically known for guidance, particularly from international figures who often seek to flatter and admire the American leader.

However, the Central American nation's authoritarian leader Bukele has adopted a distinct approach by urging the Trump administration to follow his example in impeaching what he terms “corrupt judges.”

The call for the president to take action against the US judiciary also received support from Maga figures, such as an X post by former supporter the billionaire, who has previously amplified Bukele's demands to impeach US judges.

Growing Threats to Court Autonomy

Analysts say that the leader's latest intervention come at a time of unmatched dangers to court autonomy and individual judges in the United States, and during a period where the president's team is using comparable strong-arm tactics used by leaders in countries such as Turkey, Hungary, the Asian nation, and Bukele's own El Salvador to undermine democratic accountability.

The president'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, including a spring claim that the US was “facing a judicial coup,” and ridicule of a court's order to stop removal operations sending accused undocumented individuals to his nation's brutal correctional facilities.

Attacks on Oregon Justice

Bukele's demand for removal was also issued during online criticism on the state's federal judge Judge Immergut by White House aide Miller, former AG Bondi, Musk, and the president personally in a latest press gaggle.

Immergut had issued restraining orders blocking the administration from deploying the military reserves, first in the state then in the West Coast state. The president has been eager to dispatch troops into the city, which the president has characterized as “battle-scarred” based on small, non-violent protests outside the urban homeland security facility.

Record of Targeting Judges

Miller, Bondi, and Musk have a history of criticizing judges who have blocked presidential directives or otherwise hindered the government's policy goals. Prior to resuming office recently, the president urged his followers against judges presiding over his civil and criminal trials, who were then deluged with intimidation and harassment.

Watchdog organizations, police departments, and the justices have pointed to a heightened climate of risks and intimidation in the period since he re-entered the White House.

Increasing Threat Statistics

Based on data gathered by the US Marshals Service, in 2025 through the end of September, there were over five hundred incidents to nearly four hundred federal judges, giving rise to 805 investigations. This year has already surpassed 2022, and 2024, and is likely to exceed 2023's high of 630 reported incidents.

The dangers are not just happening at the national level. Data from Princeton's Bridging Divides Initiative indicates that there have been at least fifty-nine cases of intimidation, harassment, stalking, or physical attacks directed against judges on the local level in the current year.

Expert Analysis on Root Causes

Experts state that the intimidation are a product of the language coming from top government officials.

In May, the watchdog group published a detailed report claiming that “harmful and highly irresponsible statements from Trump administration members and allies align with rising violent posts on online platforms.” It noted “a 54% rise in calls for impeachment and physical intimidation against judges across digital networks from the first two months of this year, the first full month of the president's term.”

Heidi Beirich, the co-founder of the organization, said: “The president's threats against judges have certainly fueled digital abuse at judges and calls for impeachment. Attacking the courts is one more step in Trump’s advance towards strongman rule.”

International Strongman Tactics

This progression towards autocracy has been well-trodden in the past decade in multiple countries, including by Bukele.

In 2021, right after starting a second term despite legal bans, Bukele’s allies in congress voted to dismiss the country’s top prosecutor and several justices on the supreme court. The justices, who had provoked his ire by rejecting pandemic policies, made way for new appointees selected by Bukele.

The move echoed the Hungarian leader's remodeling of the nation's judiciary several years back; Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s judicial purges in 2019; and attempts at comparable actions in the Middle Eastern state and the European country.

Undermining Judicial Independence

Analysts say that the threats and rhetorical attacks in the US can be seen as efforts to weaken court autonomy in a structure that offers no easy way for the president to remove judges Trump disapproves of.

Leonard, an associate professor at Illinois State University who has studied democratic decline in free nations, said the Trump administration had taken cues from the examples set by strongmen abroad.

“The administration is looking around 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.

Citing instances such as the advisor's relentless claims of broad presidential authority, she noted: “They openly attack the judiciary by repeating over and over that it is not a equal branch in the government structure.

“They persist in reframe the discussion by repeating their claim that the executive has more power than this judicial branch, which is not how separation powers work.”

The professor said: “Justices' only protection is people’s belief in the legitimacy of their ability to make those decisions. Individual threats on top of weakening trust in courts may make judges hesitate about judgments that go against the sitting government, which is, of course, highly concerning for court oversight and for democracy.”

Intimidation Tactics

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

She pointed to a series of so-called “pizza doxxings” recently, in which judges have received unsolicited 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 Salas.

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

“Federal judges are protected by the Secret Service and the Marshals Service. And those are both specialized law enforcement that are placed institutionally inside the Department of Justice. And the former AG has been spearheading the criticism on federal judges.”

Government Goals

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