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Donald Trump is not typically known for counsel, particularly from foreign leaders who frequently attempt to flatter and compliment the American leader.

But, the Central American nation's strongman president Nayib Bukele has followed a different approach by urging the Trump administration to follow his example in impeaching so-called “corrupt judges.”

His appeal for the president to move against the American court system also received backing from Trump allies, including an social media message by one-time supporter Elon Musk, who has previously boosted Bukele's demands to oust US judges.

Growing Threats to Judicial Independence

Analysts note that the leader's latest remarks come at a time of unmatched dangers to judicial independence and specific justices in the United States, and during a period where the president's team is employing similar strong-arm methods employed by leaders in nations such as Turkey, Hungary, India, and Bukele's own the Central American country to undermine democratic accountability.

Bukele's social media statement recently was one more in a long series of provocations and allegations he has leveled against the American judiciary, such as a spring claim that the US was “facing a judicial coup,” and ridicule of a court's ruling to stop removal operations transporting suspected illegal immigrants to his country's brutal correctional facilities.

Attacks on Oregon Justice

Bukele's impeachment call was also made amid social media criticism on the state's federal judge Karin Immergut by presidential advisor Miller, attorney general Pam Bondi, Musk, and the president personally in a recent media briefing.

Immergut had ordered restraining orders blocking Trump from mobilizing the national guard, first in the state then in California. Trump has been pushing to send soldiers into Portland, which the leader has characterized as “war-ravaged” based on limited, non-violent protests outside the urban homeland security facility.

Record of Targeting Justices

The advisor, the former AG, and the entrepreneur have a long record of criticizing judges who have blocked presidential directives or in other ways impeded the government's political agenda. Prior to returning to power recently, Trump urged his supporters against judges overseeing his civil and criminal trials, who were then inundated with threats and harassment.

Monitoring groups, police departments, and the justices have highlighted a increased climate of risks and coercion in the period since he returned to the presidency.

Rising Risk Data

Based on information collected by the US Marshals Service, in 2025 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. 2025 has already eclipsed 2022, and 2024, and is on track to top the previous year's high of over six hundred threats.

The threats are not only happening at the national level. Information by Princeton's research project indicates that there have been at least fifty-nine cases of threats, targeting, surveillance, or violence directed against judges on the local level in 2025.

Expert Analysis on Root Causes

Experts say that the threats are a result of the rhetoric coming from top government officials.

In spring, the watchdog group published a comprehensive report alleging that “harmful and reckless statements from White House allies and allies coincide with escalating violent posts on online platforms.” It noted “a 54% rise in demands for impeachment and physical intimidation against judges across social media platforms from the first two months 2025, the first full month of Trump’s administration.”

Beirich, the co-founder of the organization, said: “Trump’s warnings against judges have definitely fueled online vitriol at judges and calls for ouster. Targeting the courts is one more step in the administration's advance towards authoritarianism.”

International Authoritarian Tactics

This progression towards autocracy has been well-trodden in the past decade in multiple countries, such as by the Salvadoran.

In several years ago, right after starting a new term despite constitutional prohibitions, Bukele’s allies in congress voted to remove the country’s attorney general and several judges on the constitutional court. The justices, who had provoked his ire by rejecting coronavirus measures, were replaced by new appointees hand picked 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 efforts at similar moves in the Middle Eastern state and the European country.

Undermining Court Autonomy

Experts explain that the intimidation and verbal assaults in the US can be seen as attempts to weaken judicial independence in a structure that offers no easy way for the president to remove judges the administration opposes.

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

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

Citing instances such as Miller’s persistent assertions of broad executive power, she noted: “They directly attack the courts by repeating repeatedly that it is not a equal branch in the separation of powers.

“They continue to reframe the debate by emphasizing their argument that the president has greater authority than this judicial branch, which is not how checks and balances work.”

Leonard said: “Justices' only protection is people’s belief in the legitimacy of their ability to make those rulings. Personal intimidation on top of eroding institutional legitimacy may make judges think twice about judgments that go against the current administration, which is, of course, highly concerning for court oversight and for democracy.”

Coercion Methods

Scheppele, professor of social science and international affairs at Princeton University, has written about the use of “autocratic legalism” by the likes of Orbán and the Russian, and has spoken out about rising dangers to judges in the US.

She pointed to a wave of termed “harassment deliveries” recently, in which judges have received unsolicited pizza deliveries with the recipient listed as Daniel Anderl, the child of Justice Salas, who was murdered at the residence in several years ago by a gunman targeting the judge.

“All understands what it means. ‘Your address is known. You are a target,’” the professor said.

“Federal judges are protected by the presidential protection and the federal police. And these are specialized police units that are placed structurally inside the federal agency. And Pam Bondi has been leading the attacks on federal judges.”

Government Goals

Regarding the government's aims, Scheppele said that “removing a US justice is almost certainly not going to happen because it’s very difficult to do. {Right now|Currently