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The US President rarely accepts advice, especially from foreign leaders who often seek to flatter and admire the American leader.

But, El Salvador's strongman president Bukele has adopted a distinct approach by urging the White House to follow his example in impeaching so-called “dishonest judges.”

The call for Trump to move against the American court system also garnered support from Maga figures, such as an X post by one-time supporter the billionaire, who has previously boosted Bukele's demands to oust US judges.

Unprecedented Risks to Court Autonomy

Experts say that Bukele's latest intervention come at a time of unmatched threats to court autonomy and specific justices in the United States, and during a phase where the Trump administration is employing comparable strong-arm tactics used by leaders in countries such as Türkiye, the European state, India, and Bukele's own the Central American country to weaken democratic accountability.

Bukele's online call recently was just the latest in a long series of provocations and claims he has made against the US's legal system, including a March assertion that the US was “experiencing a judicial coup,” and his mockery of a federal judge's order to halt deportation flights transporting accused undocumented individuals to his country's harsh correctional facilities.

Criticism on Federal Judge

The Salvadoran's impeachment call was also made during online attacks on Oregon federal judge Karin Immergut by White House aide Miller, former AG Pam Bondi, Musk, and Trump personally in a latest press gaggle.

The judge had ordered injunctions blocking the administration from mobilizing the national guard, initially in Oregon then in California. The president has been pushing to send troops into Portland, which the leader has characterized as “war-ravaged” based on limited, peaceful demonstrations outside the urban homeland security facility.

Record of Attacking Judges

The advisor, the former AG, and Musk have a long record of criticizing judges who have ruled against presidential directives or otherwise impeded the government's political agenda. Prior to returning to power recently, Trump urged his supporters against judges presiding over his legal cases, who were then deluged with intimidation and abuse.

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

Increasing Threat Statistics

Based on data collected by the federal agency, in the current year through the end of September, there were 562 threats to 395 US justices, giving rise to more than eight hundred inquiries. 2025 has already eclipsed 2022, and 2024, and is on track to top 2023's record of 630 threats.

The threats are not just happening at the national level. Information by Princeton's research project indicates that there have been at least fifty-nine cases of intimidation, harassment, stalking, or physical attacks directed against judges on the state and municipal levels in the current year.

Expert Analysis on Root Causes

Specialists state that the threats are a result of the language coming from top government officials.

In spring, the Global Project Against Hate and Extremism (GPAHE) published a detailed report alleging that “harmful and highly irresponsible statements from White House allies and allies coincide with escalating violent posts on social media.” It recorded “a fifty-four percent rise in demands for removal and physical intimidation against judges across digital networks from the first two months of this year, the first full month of Trump’s administration.”

Beirich, the co-founder of the organization, said: “Trump’s warnings against judges have certainly driven digital abuse at judges and calls for ouster. Attacking the judiciary is one more step in the administration's advance towards strongman rule.”

International Authoritarian Playbook

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

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

The move echoed the Hungarian leader's remodeling of the nation's judiciary several years back; Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s judicial purges recently; and attempts at similar moves in Israel and Poland.

Undermining Court Autonomy

Analysts say that the threats and rhetorical attacks in the US can be viewed as efforts to undermine judicial independence in a system that offers no easy way for the president to remove judges the administration disapproves of.

Leonard, an academic at Illinois State University who has studied authoritarian backsliding in democracies, said the White House had learned from the examples set by authoritarians abroad.

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

Citing examples such as Miller’s persistent assertions of nearly limitless presidential authority, she noted: “They openly attack the judiciary by repeating over and over that it is not a co-equal branch in the government structure.

“They persist in reframe the debate by emphasizing their claim that the executive has greater authority than this other co-equal branch, which is not how separation powers work.”

The professor said: “Judges' only protection is public trust in the authority of their ability to make those decisions. Personal intimidation on top of weakening trust in courts may make judges think twice about decisions that go against the sitting government, which is, of course, massively problematic for judicial review and for the political system.”

Intimidation Tactics

Scheppele, academic of sociology and international affairs at the Ivy League school, has written about the use of “authoritarian law” by the such as the Hungarian and the Russian, and has warned about escalating threats to judges in the US.

She pointed to a wave of termed “harassment deliveries” this year, in which judges have received unsolicited pizza deliveries with the recipient listed as a name, the child of Justice Salas, who was killed at the judge’s home in 2020 by a assailant aiming at Salas.

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

“Federal judges are protected by the presidential protection and the Marshals Service. And those are both specialized law enforcement that sit structurally inside the Department of Justice. And the former AG has been spearheading the attacks on federal judges.”

Government Goals

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