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The US President is not typically known for advice, especially from international figures who frequently attempt to flatter and compliment the US president.

However, the Central American nation's authoritarian leader Bukele has adopted a different strategy by urging the Trump administration to follow his example in impeaching so-called “corrupt judges.”

The call for Trump to move against the US judiciary also received backing from Maga figures, such as an X post by former supporter Elon Musk, who has in the past amplified the Salvadoran's calls to oust US judges.

Growing Threats to Court Autonomy

Experts say that the leader's latest remarks occur of unmatched threats to judicial independence and specific justices in the US, and during a phase where the president's team is employing comparable authoritarian tactics used by rulers in countries such as Türkiye, Hungary, the Asian nation, and Bukele's own the Central American country to weaken government oversight.

The president's social media statement recently was one more in a long series of taunts and allegations he has leveled against the US's legal system, including a spring assertion that the US was “experiencing a judicial coup,” and ridicule of a federal judge's order to stop removal operations transporting accused illegal immigrants to his nation's brutal correctional facilities.

Attacks on Oregon Justice

The Salvadoran's impeachment call was also made amid social media attacks on Oregon federal judge Judge Immergut by presidential advisor Miller, attorney general Bondi, Musk, and the president personally in a latest media briefing.

The judge had ordered restraining orders blocking Trump from mobilizing the military reserves, first in the state then in the West Coast state. The president has been eager to dispatch soldiers into Portland, which the president has characterized as “battle-scarred” based on limited, non-violent demonstrations outside the city's homeland security facility.

History of Attacking Judges

The advisor, Bondi, and the entrepreneur have a history of criticizing judges who have blocked Trump's executive orders or otherwise hindered the administration's policy goals. Before resuming office recently, the president urged his supporters against judges overseeing his civil and criminal trials, who were then deluged with threats and harassment.

Watchdog organizations, police departments, and judges themselves have highlighted a heightened climate of threats and coercion in the months since he returned to the presidency.

Rising Threat Statistics

According to data gathered by the federal agency, in the current year through the third quarter, there were 562 incidents to 395 federal judges, leading to 805 inquiries. 2025 has already surpassed 2022, and 2024, and is likely to exceed the previous year's record of over six hundred threats.

The threats are not only happening at the national level. Information by the university's Bridging Divides Initiative indicates that there have been at least fifty-nine cases of intimidation, targeting, surveillance, or physical attacks committed against judges on the local level in the current year.

Expert Analysis on Threat Sources

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

In spring, the Global Project Against Hate and Extremism (GPAHE) published a detailed report claiming that “malicious and reckless statements from Trump administration members and supporters coincide with escalating aggressive posts on social media.” It noted “a 54% increase in calls for impeachment and violent threats against judges across digital networks from the first two months of this year, the initial period of Trump’s administration.”

Beirich, the founder of GPAHE, said: “The president's threats against judges have definitely fueled digital abuse at judges and demands for impeachment. Targeting the judiciary is one more step in Trump’s advance towards authoritarianism.”

International Strongman Tactics

That march towards autocracy has been well-trodden in the past decade in several nations, such as by the Salvadoran.

In several years ago, immediately after commencing a new term in the face of constitutional prohibitions, the president's allies in congress voted to dismiss the nation's attorney general and five justices on the supreme court. The judges, who had provoked his ire by ruling against coronavirus measures, were replaced by replacements hand picked by Bukele.

The move echoed the Hungarian leader's overhaul of Hungary’s court system in 2018; Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s judicial purges recently; and efforts at comparable actions in the Middle Eastern state and the European country.

Weakening Judicial Independence

Experts say that the threats and verbal assaults in the US can be seen as efforts to undermine judicial independence in a structure that provides no simple method for the president to remove judges Trump disapproves of.

Leonard, an associate professor at the university who has studied democratic decline in democracies, said the Trump administration had learned from the models set by authoritarians 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 undermine the courts,” she said.

Citing instances such as Miller’s relentless assertions of nearly limitless presidential authority, she added: “They openly criticize the courts by stating repeatedly that it is not a equal branch in the government structure.

“They persist in redefine the debate by emphasizing their claim that the president has greater authority than this judicial branch, which is not how separation powers work.”

The professor said: “Justices' sole safeguard is people’s belief in the legitimacy of their capacity to make those decisions. Personal intimidation on top of weakening institutional legitimacy may make judges hesitate about decisions that go against the current administration, which is, of course, highly concerning for judicial review and for the political system.”

Coercion Methods

Kim Lane Scheppele, professor of sociology and international affairs at Princeton University, has written about the use of “autocratic legalism” by the such as the Hungarian and the Russian, and has warned about escalating threats to judges in the US.

She highlighted a wave of so-called “pizza doxxings” this year, in which judges have received unsolicited food orders with the customer listed as Daniel Anderl, the son of Justice Salas, who was killed at the residence in 2020 by a gunman targeting the judge.

“Everyone understands what it means. ‘We know where you live. We’re coming for you,’” Scheppele said.

“US justices are guarded by the Secret Service and the federal police. And those are both specialized police units that sit structurally inside the Department of Justice. And Pam Bondi has been leading the attacks on federal judges.”

Administration Aims

On the government's aims, the expert said that “removing a US justice is highly not going to happen because it’s so hard to do. {Right now|Currently