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The US President is not typically known for counsel, particularly from international figures who often attempt to praise and compliment the US president.

However, the Central American nation's authoritarian leader Nayib Bukele has followed a different approach by calling on the Trump administration to emulate his actions in removing so-called “dishonest judges.”

His appeal for the president to move against the US judiciary also received backing from Trump allies, such as an social media message by one-time close Trump ally Elon Musk, who has in the past boosted Bukele's calls to oust US judges.

Growing Threats to Judicial Independence

Experts say that Bukele's recent intervention occur of unprecedented threats to court autonomy and specific justices in the US, and during a phase where the president's team is employing similar strong-arm methods used by rulers in countries such as Türkiye, Hungary, India, and Bukele's own the Central American country to undermine democratic accountability.

Bukele's social media call last week was one more in a string of taunts and claims he has leveled against the US's legal system, including a spring assertion that the US was “facing a court takeover,” and ridicule of a federal judge's order to stop removal operations sending suspected undocumented individuals to his nation's brutal prison system.

Attacks on Federal Judge

Bukele's demand for removal was also made amid online attacks on the state's justice Karin Immergut by presidential advisor Stephen Miller, former AG Bondi, Elon Musk, and Trump personally in a recent media briefing.

Immergut 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 dispatch soldiers into Portland, which the president has characterized as “battle-scarred” based on small, non-violent demonstrations outside the city's federal building.

History of Targeting Justices

Miller, Bondi, and Musk have a long record of attacking judges who have blocked presidential directives or otherwise impeded the government's political agenda. Before resuming office recently, Trump directed his followers against judges presiding over his civil and criminal trials, who were then deluged with intimidation and harassment.

Watchdog organizations, law enforcement agencies, and judges themselves have highlighted a increased atmosphere of risks and intimidation in the months since he returned to the White House.

Rising Risk Data

Based on information collected by the US Marshals Service, in the current year through the third quarter, there were over five hundred incidents to 395 US justices, leading to more than eight hundred investigations. 2025 has already surpassed the first recorded year, and 2024, and is on track to top the previous year's record of over six hundred threats.

The threats are not only happening at the national level. Data from the university's research project shows that there have been at least fifty-nine cases of intimidation, targeting, stalking, or violence directed against judges on the state and municipal levels in 2025.

Expert Insights on Root Causes

Experts say that the threats are a product of the language coming from top government officials.

In May, the Global Project Against Hate and Extremism (GPAHE) published a comprehensive report alleging that “harmful and highly irresponsible statements from White House allies and supporters align with rising violent posts on social media.” It noted “a 54% increase in demands for impeachment and physical intimidation against judges across digital networks from the first two months of this year, the first full month of the president's term.”

Beirich, the co-founder of GPAHE, said: “The president's threats against judges have definitely driven online vitriol at judges and demands for ouster. Attacking the courts is one more step in the administration's march towards strongman rule.”

Global Authoritarian Playbook

This progression towards autocracy has been common in the past decade in several nations, such as by Bukele.

In 2021, right after starting a new term in the face of legal bans, the president's allies in congress voted to remove the nation's attorney general and five judges on the constitutional court. The justices, who had angered him by ruling against pandemic policies, were replaced by replacements hand picked by the leader.

The move mirrored Viktor Orbán’s remodeling of the nation's judiciary several years back; the Turkish president's judicial purges in 2019; and attempts at similar moves in Israel and the European country.

Undermining Court Autonomy

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

Meghan Leonard, an academic at the university who has researched authoritarian backsliding in democracies, said the White House had taken cues from the models set by strongmen overseas.

“The government is looking around at these successes and failures. They know they’re not going to be able to enact any laws that would weaken the courts,” she said.

Citing instances such as Miller’s relentless assertions of broad presidential authority, she noted: “They directly attack the courts by stating over and over that it is not a equal branch in the government structure.

“They persist in reframe the discussion by emphasizing their argument that the president has greater authority than this other co-equal branch, which is not how checks and balances work.”

Leonard said: “Judges' only protection is people’s belief in the authority of their ability to make those rulings. Personal intimidation on top of weakening institutional legitimacy may make judges hesitate about decisions that go against the sitting government, which is, of course, highly concerning for court oversight and for democracy.”

Coercion Methods

Kim Lane Scheppele, professor of sociology and international affairs at Princeton University, has documented the use of “autocratic legalism” by the likes of Orbán and Putin, and has spoken out about escalating threats to judges in the US.

She highlighted a series of so-called “harassment deliveries” this year, in which judges have received unwanted pizza deliveries with the customer listed as a name, the son of Justice Salas, who was murdered at the residence in 2020 by a assailant targeting Salas.

“All understands what it means. ‘Your address is known. You are a target,’” Scheppele said.

“Federal judges are guarded by the Secret Service and the Marshals Service. And these are dedicated police units that sit structurally inside the Department of Justice. And Pam Bondi has been spearheading the criticism on justices.”

Government Goals

On the administration’s aims, Scheppele said that “impeaching a federal judge is almost certainly not going to happen because it’s very difficult to do. {Right now|Currently