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

But, El Salvador's authoritarian leader Bukele has adopted a different strategy by calling on the Trump administration to emulate his actions in impeaching what he terms “dishonest judges.”

His appeal for Trump to move against the US judiciary also garnered support from Maga figures, such as an social media message by one-time close Trump ally Elon Musk, who has in the past amplified Bukele's demands to oust US judges.

Unprecedented Threats to Judicial Independence

Analysts say that Bukele's recent remarks come at a time of unmatched dangers to judicial independence and specific justices in the United States, and during a phase where the president's team is employing comparable strong-arm tactics employed by rulers in nations such as Turkey, Hungary, India, and his native the Central American country to weaken democratic accountability.

Bukele's social media statement recently was just the latest in a string of taunts and allegations he has made against the US's legal system, including a March claim that the US was “experiencing a judicial coup,” and his mockery of a court's ruling to halt deportation flights sending suspected undocumented individuals to his country's harsh correctional facilities.

Attacks on Oregon Justice

Bukele's demand for removal was also made during social media attacks on the state's federal judge Karin Immergut by presidential advisor Miller, former AG Bondi, Elon Musk, and Trump himself in a recent press gaggle.

The judge had issued restraining orders preventing Trump from mobilizing the military reserves, initially in Oregon then in the West Coast state. Trump has been pushing to send troops into Portland, which the president has characterized as “battle-scarred” based on small, peaceful protests outside the urban federal building.

Record of Attacking Judges

Miller, Bondi, and the entrepreneur have a long record of attacking judges who have blocked Trump's executive orders or otherwise hindered the administration's political agenda. Before returning to power recently, Trump directed his followers against judges overseeing his legal cases, who were then inundated with threats and harassment.

Monitoring groups, law enforcement agencies, and judges themselves have pointed to a increased climate of threats and coercion in the period since he re-entered the White House.

Increasing Threat Statistics

Based on information gathered by the US Marshals Service, in 2025 through the end of September, there were 562 incidents to nearly four hundred US justices, giving rise to 805 investigations. 2025 has already surpassed 2022, and last year, and is on track to exceed 2023's record of over six hundred reported incidents.

The dangers are not only happening at the national level. Data from Princeton's research project indicates that there have been at least fifty-nine instances of intimidation, targeting, stalking, or physical attacks committed against judges on the local level in 2025.

Expert Analysis on Root Causes

Experts say that the intimidation are a result 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 online platforms.” 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 first full month of the president's term.”

Heidi Beirich, the co-founder of the organization, said: “Trump’s threats against judges have definitely fueled online vitriol at judges and calls for impeachment. Attacking the courts is another move in the administration's advance towards strongman rule.”

Global Strongman Tactics

This progression towards autocracy has been common in recent years in several countries, such as by Bukele.

In 2021, immediately after starting a new term in the face of constitutional prohibitions, the president's parliamentary loyalists voted to dismiss the nation's top prosecutor and five judges on the constitutional court. The judges, who had provoked his ire by rejecting pandemic policies, made way for new appointees selected by the leader.

The move mirrored the Hungarian leader's remodeling of the nation's judiciary several years back; the Turkish president's judicial purges in 2019; and efforts at comparable actions in the Middle Eastern state and Poland.

Undermining Judicial Independence

Experts say that the threats and rhetorical attacks in the US can be seen as efforts to undermine court autonomy in a structure that offers no easy way for the executive to remove judges Trump disapproves of.

Meghan Leonard, an associate professor at Illinois State University who has researched 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 failures. They know they’re not going to be able to pass any laws that would weaken the courts,” she said.

Pointing to examples such as Miller’s persistent assertions of broad presidential authority, she added: “They directly criticize the judiciary by repeating repeatedly that it is not a co-equal branch in the government structure.

“They continue to reframe the debate by repeating their claim that the president has more power than this other co-equal branch, which is not how separation powers work.”

The professor said: “Justices' sole safeguard is people’s belief in the authority of their capacity to make those rulings. Personal intimidation on top of weakening trust in courts may make judges hesitate about judgments that go against the sitting government, which is, of course, massively problematic for court oversight and for democracy.”

Coercion Methods

Kim Lane Scheppele, professor of sociology and international affairs at the Ivy League school, has written about the use of “autocratic legalism” by the such as Orbán and Putin, and has spoken out about escalating threats to judges in the US.

She pointed to a series of termed “pizza doxxings” this year, in which judges have received unwanted food orders with the recipient listed as a name, the child of Judge Esther Salas, who was murdered at the residence in several years ago by a assailant targeting Salas.

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

“Federal judges are protected by the Secret Service and the federal police. And those are both specialized police units that are placed institutionally inside the Department of Justice. And the former AG has been leading the attacks on federal judges.”

Administration Aims

On the administration’s objectives, the expert said that “impeaching a US justice is almost certainly not going to happen because it’s very difficult to do. {Right now|Currently