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Donald Trump rarely accepts advice, especially from foreign leaders who often attempt to praise and compliment the American leader.

However, El Salvador's authoritarian leader Nayib Bukele has adopted a distinct strategy by urging the Trump administration to emulate his actions in impeaching so-called “dishonest judges.”

The call for Trump to move against the American court system also garnered backing from Trump allies, such as an social media message by former close Trump ally the billionaire, who has in the past boosted Bukele's calls to impeach US judges.

Unprecedented Threats to Judicial Independence

Experts note that Bukele's recent remarks come at a time of unprecedented dangers to court autonomy and individual judges in the US, and during a phase where the president's team is using comparable strong-arm methods employed by leaders in nations such as Turkey, the European state, India, and his native El Salvador to weaken democratic accountability.

Bukele's social media call last week was just the latest in a long series of provocations and claims he has made against the US's legal system, including a spring assertion that the US was “experiencing a court takeover,” and ridicule of a federal judge's order to stop deportation flights sending suspected undocumented individuals to his country's brutal correctional facilities.

Attacks on Federal Judge

Bukele's impeachment call was also issued amid online attacks on the state's justice Karin Immergut by presidential advisor Stephen Miller, attorney general Bondi, Musk, and Trump personally in a recent press gaggle.

Immergut had issued injunctions blocking Trump from mobilizing the military reserves, initially in Oregon then in the West Coast state. The president has been eager to dispatch soldiers into the city, which the president has described as “battle-scarred” based on small, peaceful protests outside the urban federal building.

History of Attacking Judges

Miller, the former AG, and the entrepreneur have a long record of attacking judges who have blocked presidential directives or otherwise hindered the administration's policy goals. Prior to resuming office this year, Trump directed his followers against judges overseeing his civil and criminal trials, who were then deluged with intimidation and abuse.

Watchdog organizations, law enforcement agencies, and judges themselves have pointed to a increased climate of threats and coercion in the months since he re-entered 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, leading to 805 investigations. 2025 has already surpassed the first recorded year, and last year, and is likely to exceed the previous year's high of 630 threats.

The dangers are not just happening at the national level. Information by the university's research project shows that there have been at least fifty-nine instances of intimidation, targeting, surveillance, or violence directed against judges on the local level in the current year.

Analyst Analysis on Threat Sources

Specialists say that the threats are a product of the language coming from senior administration figures.

In spring, the watchdog group published a comprehensive report alleging that “harmful and reckless statements from White House allies and supporters align with escalating aggressive posts on online platforms.” It recorded “a fifty-four percent increase in calls for removal and physical intimidation against judges across digital networks from January to February of this year, the initial period of the president's term.”

Beirich, the co-founder of the organization, said: “The president's warnings against judges have certainly fueled online vitriol at judges and calls for impeachment. Targeting the judiciary is one more step in the administration's advance towards strongman rule.”

International Strongman Tactics

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

In several years ago, immediately after commencing a new term despite constitutional prohibitions, Bukele’s allies in congress voted to dismiss the nation's top prosecutor and five justices on the constitutional court. The justices, who had angered him by ruling against coronavirus measures, were replaced by replacements selected by Bukele.

The move mirrored the Hungarian leader's overhaul of Hungary’s court system in 2018; Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s judicial purges recently; and attempts at comparable actions in Israel and the European country.

Undermining Court Autonomy

Analysts explain that the threats and verbal assaults in the US can be viewed as attempts to weaken judicial independence in a structure that offers no easy way for the president to remove judges Trump opposes.

Leonard, an academic at the university who has studied democratic decline in free nations, said the White House had taken cues from the models set by authoritarians abroad.

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

Citing examples such as the advisor's persistent claims of nearly limitless executive power, she added: “They openly attack the judiciary by repeating repeatedly that it is not a co-equal branch in the government structure.

“They persist in redefine the discussion by emphasizing their argument that the executive has more power than this other co-equal branch, which is not how separation powers work.”

The professor said: “Justices' only protection is people’s belief in the legitimacy of their capacity to make those rulings. Personal intimidation on top of eroding institutional legitimacy may make judges think twice about decisions that go against the sitting government, which is, of course, highly concerning for judicial review and for the political system.”

Intimidation Tactics

Kim Lane Scheppele, professor of social science and global studies at Princeton University, has written about the use of “authoritarian law” by the such as Orbán and the Russian, and has warned about rising dangers to judges in the US.

She highlighted a wave of termed “pizza doxxings” this year, in which judges have received unsolicited food orders with the customer listed as a name, the son of Justice Salas, who was killed at the residence in 2020 by a assailant targeting Salas.

“Everyone understands what it means. ‘We know where you live. You are a target,’” the professor said.

“US justices are protected by the presidential protection and the federal police. And these are specialized police units that are placed institutionally inside the Department of Justice. And Pam Bondi has been leading the criticism on federal judges.”

Administration Aims

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