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Donald Trump rarely accepts counsel, especially from international figures who frequently seek to praise and admire the US president.

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

His appeal for Trump to take action against the US judiciary also received backing from Trump allies, such as an X post by one-time close Trump ally the billionaire, who has in the past boosted the Salvadoran's calls to impeach US judges.

Unprecedented Risks to Judicial Independence

Experts note that the leader's latest intervention occur of unprecedented threats to court autonomy and individual judges in the United States, and during a period where the Trump administration is employing similar strong-arm tactics used by leaders in nations such as Türkiye, Hungary, India, and Bukele's own the Central American country to undermine democratic accountability.

Bukele's online statement last week was just the latest in a long series of taunts and claims he has leveled against the US's legal system, such as a March claim that the US was “experiencing a court takeover,” and ridicule of a court's order to halt deportation flights sending accused undocumented individuals to his country's brutal prison system.

Attacks on Federal Judge

The Salvadoran's impeachment call was also made amid social media attacks on the state's federal judge Karin Immergut by White House aide Miller, former AG Bondi, Elon Musk, and the president personally in a recent media briefing.

Immergut had issued restraining orders preventing the administration from deploying the military reserves, initially in the state then in California. The president has been pushing to send troops into the city, which the president has characterized as “battle-scarred” based on small, peaceful protests outside the city's federal building.

Record of Targeting Judges

Miller, the former AG, and the entrepreneur have a long record of criticizing judges who have ruled against presidential directives or in other ways hindered the administration's political agenda. Prior to returning to power recently, the president urged his followers against judges presiding over his legal cases, who were then deluged with threats and abuse.

Watchdog organizations, law enforcement agencies, and judges themselves have highlighted a heightened climate of threats and intimidation in the months since he re-entered the presidency.

Increasing Risk Data

According to information collected by the US Marshals Service, in the current year through the end of September, there were over five hundred incidents to nearly four hundred US justices, giving rise to more than eight hundred inquiries. This year has already surpassed the first recorded year, and last year, and is on track to top the previous year's record of over six hundred threats.

The dangers are not just happening at the national level. Data from the university's research project shows that there have been at least fifty-nine instances of threats, harassment, stalking, or violence directed against judges on the state and municipal levels in 2025.

Analyst Insights on Root Causes

Specialists state 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 “harmful and highly irresponsible statements from Trump administration members and allies align with rising violent posts on social media.” It noted “a fifty-four percent rise in calls for impeachment and violent threats against judges across digital networks from the first two months of this year, the first full month of Trump’s administration.”

Heidi Beirich, the founder of the organization, said: “Trump’s warnings against judges have certainly driven online vitriol at judges and calls for impeachment. Targeting the judiciary is another move in the administration's advance towards authoritarianism.”

Global Strongman Tactics

That march towards authoritarianism has been well-trodden in recent years in several countries, including by the Salvadoran.

In 2021, immediately after commencing a second term in the face of legal bans, the president's parliamentary loyalists voted to remove the nation's attorney general and five judges on the supreme court. The justices, who had angered him by rejecting coronavirus measures, made way for new appointees selected by Bukele.

The action echoed the Hungarian leader's remodeling of the nation's judiciary in 2018; Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s judicial purges in 2019; and attempts at similar moves in the Middle Eastern state and the European country.

Weakening Court Autonomy

Experts say that the threats and verbal assaults in the US can be seen as attempts to weaken judicial independence in a structure that provides no simple method for the executive to dismiss judges Trump 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 abroad.

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

Citing instances such as Miller’s relentless claims of broad presidential authority, she noted: “They openly criticize the courts by repeating repeatedly that it is not a equal branch in the separation of powers.

“They continue to redefine the discussion by repeating their argument that the executive 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 authority of their capacity to make those rulings. Personal intimidation on top of eroding trust in courts may make judges hesitate about judgments that go against the sitting government, which is, of course, massively problematic for judicial review and for the political system.”

Coercion Methods

Scheppele, academic of sociology and global studies at Princeton University, has written about 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 termed “pizza doxxings” this year, in which judges have received unwanted food orders with the customer listed as Daniel Anderl, the child of Justice Salas, who was killed at the residence in 2020 by a assailant targeting Salas.

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

“Federal judges are protected by the Secret Service and the Marshals Service. And those are both dedicated police units that sit structurally inside the Department of Justice. And Pam Bondi has been leading the criticism on justices.”

Government Goals

Regarding the administration’s objectives, Scheppele said that “impeaching a federal judge is almost certainly not going to happen because it’s so hard to do. {Right now|Currently