🔗 Share this article

Donald Trump is not typically known for guidance, especially from foreign leaders who often seek to flatter and admire the American leader.

But, the Central American nation's strongman president Nayib Bukele has followed a distinct approach by calling on the White House to follow his example in impeaching so-called “dishonest judges.”

The call for the president to take action against the American court system also garnered backing from Maga figures, including an social media message by one-time supporter the billionaire, who has previously amplified Bukele's calls to oust US judges.

Growing Risks to Court Autonomy

Analysts note that the leader's latest remarks occur of unprecedented threats to court autonomy and specific justices in the US, and during a period where the president's team is using comparable strong-arm methods employed by rulers in nations such as Turkey, the European state, India, and his native El Salvador to weaken government oversight.

The president's online statement last week was one more in a string of taunts and allegations he has leveled against the US's legal system, such as a March assertion that the US was “experiencing a court takeover,” and ridicule of a federal judge's order to halt removal operations transporting accused undocumented individuals to his country's harsh correctional facilities.

Attacks on Oregon Justice

The Salvadoran's impeachment call was also issued amid social media attacks on the state's justice Judge Immergut by presidential advisor Stephen Miller, former AG Bondi, Elon Musk, and Trump himself in a recent press gaggle.

The judge had ordered injunctions blocking Trump from deploying the national guard, first in the state then in California. The president has been eager to dispatch troops into the city, which the president has described as “war-ravaged” based on limited, peaceful protests outside the urban homeland security facility.

History of Attacking Justices

Miller, the former AG, and the entrepreneur have a history of criticizing judges who have blocked presidential directives or in other ways impeded the administration's political agenda. Before resuming office recently, Trump urged his followers against judges presiding over his legal cases, who were then deluged with threats and abuse.

Monitoring groups, police departments, and the justices have pointed to a heightened climate of threats and coercion in the period since he returned to the White House.

Rising Threat Statistics

According to data gathered by the federal agency, in 2025 through the end of September, there were 562 incidents to 395 federal judges, giving rise to 805 investigations. This year has already eclipsed 2022, and last year, and is likely to exceed the previous year's record of 630 reported incidents.

The dangers are not just happening at the national level. Information by Princeton's Bridging Divides Initiative indicates that there have been at least fifty-nine instances of intimidation, harassment, stalking, or violence directed against judges on the local level in 2025.

Expert Analysis on Threat Sources

Specialists state that the intimidation are a result of the rhetoric coming from top government officials.

In spring, the watchdog group published a comprehensive report alleging that “harmful and highly irresponsible statements from White House allies and allies align with rising violent posts on online platforms.” It recorded “a 54% rise in demands for impeachment and violent threats against judges across digital networks from the first two months 2025, the initial period of the president's term.”

Heidi Beirich, the founder of the organization, said: “Trump’s warnings against judges have certainly driven online vitriol at judges and calls for impeachment. Targeting the courts is one more step in the administration's march towards authoritarianism.”

International Authoritarian Playbook

That march towards authoritarianism has been common in recent years in several nations, such as by Bukele.

In several years ago, right after commencing a new term despite constitutional prohibitions, the president's parliamentary loyalists voted to remove the nation's attorney general and five judges on the supreme court. The judges, who had provoked his ire by rejecting coronavirus measures, were replaced by new appointees selected by the leader.

The action echoed the Hungarian leader's overhaul of the nation's judiciary several years back; Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s judicial purges in 2019; and attempts at comparable actions in the Middle Eastern state and Poland.

Weakening Judicial Independence

Analysts say that the intimidation and verbal assaults in the US can be viewed as efforts to undermine judicial independence in a system that offers no easy way for the executive to dismiss judges Trump disapproves of.

Meghan Leonard, an associate professor at the university who has studied democratic decline in democracies, said the Trump administration had learned from the examples set by strongmen abroad.

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

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

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

Leonard said: “Justices' only protection is public trust in the authority of their ability to make those decisions. Individual threats on top of eroding trust in courts may make judges hesitate about decisions that go against the sitting government, which is, of course, highly concerning for judicial review and for democracy.”

Intimidation Tactics

Kim Lane Scheppele, academic of social science and international affairs at the Ivy League school, has written about the use of “authoritarian law” by the likes of Orbán and the Russian, and has warned about escalating threats to judges in the US.

She highlighted a series of so-called “harassment deliveries” recently, in which judges have received unwanted pizza deliveries with the recipient listed as Daniel Anderl, the child of Justice Salas, who was murdered at the residence in 2020 by a assailant aiming at the judge.

“All knows what it means. ‘We know where you live. We’re coming for you,’” the professor said.

“US justices are protected by the presidential protection and the federal police. And those are both specialized law enforcement that are placed institutionally inside the Department of Justice. And Pam Bondi has been spearheading the attacks on justices.”

Government Goals

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