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Donald Trump does not usually take advice, especially from international figures who frequently attempt to flatter and admire the US president.

But, El Salvador's strongman president Bukele has adopted a different approach by calling on the Trump administration to follow his example in removing so-called “dishonest judges.”

His appeal for Trump to take action against the US judiciary also received support from Trump allies, including an social media message by one-time supporter Elon Musk, who has previously boosted Bukele's calls to oust US judges.

Growing Risks to Judicial Independence

Analysts note that Bukele's recent intervention occur of unprecedented threats to court autonomy and specific justices in the US, and during a period where the president's team is employing comparable authoritarian tactics employed by rulers in countries such as Turkey, Hungary, India, and his native the Central American country to undermine government oversight.

Bukele's online statement last week was one more in a string of provocations and allegations he has made against the American judiciary, including a March claim that the US was “experiencing a judicial coup,” and ridicule of a court's order to halt deportation flights transporting accused undocumented individuals to his country's brutal correctional facilities.

Attacks on Oregon Justice

The Salvadoran's demand for removal was also issued during social media criticism on the state's federal judge Karin Immergut by presidential advisor Miller, former AG Pam Bondi, Elon Musk, and the president himself in a recent media briefing.

Immergut had issued injunctions blocking Trump from deploying the national guard, initially in Oregon then in the West Coast state. Trump has been eager to dispatch troops into the city, which the leader has characterized as “battle-scarred” based on small, non-violent protests outside the urban federal building.

History of Targeting Judges

The advisor, the former AG, and Musk have a long record of criticizing judges who have blocked Trump's executive orders or otherwise hindered the government's policy goals. Before returning to power this year, the president urged his followers against judges presiding over his legal cases, who were then deluged with threats and harassment.

Monitoring groups, police departments, and the justices have pointed to a heightened atmosphere of risks and intimidation in the period since he returned to the presidency.

Rising Threat Statistics

Based on information gathered by the federal agency, in the current year through the third quarter, there were over five hundred threats to 395 federal judges, leading to more than eight hundred investigations. 2025 has already eclipsed 2022, and last year, and is on track to top the previous year's record of 630 threats.

The dangers are not just happening at the federal level. Data from the university's research project indicates that there have been at least fifty-nine cases of intimidation, harassment, surveillance, or physical attacks directed against judges on the local level in 2025.

Analyst Insights on Root Causes

Specialists state 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 alleging that “harmful and highly irresponsible statements from Trump administration members and allies align with escalating aggressive posts on online platforms.” It noted “a 54% rise in calls for removal and violent threats against judges across social media platforms from January to February of this year, the initial period of Trump’s administration.”

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

International Authoritarian Playbook

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

In 2021, immediately after starting a new term in the face of constitutional prohibitions, Bukele’s allies in congress voted to dismiss the nation's top prosecutor and several judges on the constitutional court. The judges, who had angered him by ruling against coronavirus measures, made way for replacements hand picked by Bukele.

The move mirrored the Hungarian leader's remodeling of Hungary’s court system in 2018; Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s court cleanups in 2019; and efforts at similar moves in the Middle Eastern state and Poland.

Weakening Judicial Independence

Analysts explain that the intimidation and rhetorical attacks in the US can be seen as attempts to weaken judicial independence in a structure that provides no simple method for the president to remove judges Trump opposes.

Meghan Leonard, an associate professor at Illinois State University who has studied authoritarian backsliding in democracies, said the White House had taken cues from the models set by authoritarians abroad.

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

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

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

Leonard said: “Judges' sole safeguard is public trust in the legitimacy of their ability to make those decisions. Personal intimidation on top of eroding trust in courts may make judges think twice about judgments that go against the sitting government, which is, of course, massively problematic for judicial review and for democracy.”

Intimidation Tactics

Kim Lane Scheppele, professor of social science and international affairs at Princeton University, has documented the use of “authoritarian law” by the such as Orbán and Putin, and has warned about rising threats to judges in the US.

She pointed to a series of termed “harassment deliveries” recently, in which judges have received unsolicited food orders with the recipient listed as Daniel Anderl, the child of Justice Salas, who was killed at the residence in 2020 by a gunman targeting the judge.

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

“Federal judges are guarded by the presidential protection and the federal police. And these are specialized police units that sit institutionally inside the federal agency. And the former AG has been leading the criticism on justices.”

Administration Aims

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