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

But, the Central American nation's authoritarian leader Nayib Bukele has adopted a distinct approach by urging the White House to emulate his actions in removing what he terms “dishonest judges.”

The call for Trump to move against the US judiciary also received support from Maga figures, including an social media message by former close Trump ally the billionaire, who has in the past boosted the Salvadoran's demands to impeach US judges.

Unprecedented Threats to Court Autonomy

Experts note that the leader's latest remarks occur of unmatched dangers to court autonomy and specific justices in the United States, and during a phase where the Trump administration is using similar authoritarian tactics used by rulers in nations such as Türkiye, Hungary, the Asian nation, and his native El Salvador to weaken government oversight.

The president's social media statement last week was just the latest in a long series of provocations and claims he has leveled against the American judiciary, including a spring claim that the US was “facing a court takeover,” and ridicule of a federal judge's order to halt deportation flights transporting accused illegal immigrants to his nation's brutal prison system.

Criticism on Federal Judge

The Salvadoran's impeachment call was also made amid social media criticism on Oregon justice Karin Immergut by White House aide Stephen Miller, attorney general Pam Bondi, Elon Musk, and Trump personally in a latest media briefing.

Immergut had issued restraining orders blocking the administration from deploying the national guard, first in the state then in California. Trump has been pushing to send troops into Portland, which the president has described as “war-ravaged” based on small, peaceful demonstrations outside the city's federal building.

Record of Attacking Justices

The advisor, the former AG, and the entrepreneur have a long record of attacking judges who have ruled against Trump's executive orders or in other ways impeded the administration's political agenda. Prior to resuming office this year, Trump urged his supporters against judges overseeing his civil and criminal trials, who were then deluged with threats and harassment.

Watchdog organizations, law enforcement agencies, and the justices have highlighted a heightened climate of threats and intimidation in the period since he re-entered the White House.

Rising Risk Data

Based on data gathered by the federal agency, in the current year through the end of September, there were over five hundred incidents to 395 federal judges, giving rise to more than eight hundred inquiries. 2025 has already surpassed 2022, and 2024, and is likely to exceed the previous year's record of over six hundred reported incidents.

The dangers are not only happening at the federal level. Information by the university's research project shows that there have been at least 59 cases of threats, harassment, stalking, or physical attacks directed against judges on the state and municipal levels in 2025.

Expert Insights on Root Causes

Specialists say that the threats are a result of the rhetoric coming from top government officials.

In May, the Global Project Against Hate and Extremism (GPAHE) published a comprehensive report alleging that “harmful and reckless statements from Trump administration members and supporters align with rising aggressive posts on social media.” It recorded “a 54% rise in demands for impeachment and physical intimidation against judges across social media platforms from the first two months of this year, the first full month of the president's term.”

Beirich, the founder of GPAHE, said: “Trump’s warnings against judges have certainly driven digital abuse at judges and calls for ouster. Targeting the judiciary is another move in the administration's advance towards authoritarianism.”

International Authoritarian Playbook

That march towards autocracy has been well-trodden in recent years in multiple countries, such as by Bukele.

In several years ago, right after starting a second term in the face of constitutional prohibitions, Bukele’s parliamentary loyalists voted to remove the country’s top prosecutor and five judges on the supreme court. The judges, who had provoked his ire by rejecting coronavirus measures, were replaced by replacements selected by the leader.

The move echoed Viktor Orbán’s remodeling of Hungary’s court system in 2018; the Turkish president's court cleanups recently; and efforts at similar moves in the Middle Eastern state and the European country.

Undermining Judicial Independence

Analysts explain that the intimidation and verbal assaults in the US can be viewed as attempts to undermine judicial independence in a structure that offers no easy way for the executive to dismiss judges the administration opposes.

Meghan Leonard, an associate professor at Illinois State University who has studied authoritarian backsliding in free nations, said the Trump administration had learned from the examples set by strongmen abroad.

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

Pointing to instances such as the advisor's persistent claims of nearly limitless presidential authority, she added: “They openly criticize the courts by stating repeatedly that it is not a co-equal branch in the separation of powers.

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

Leonard said: “Justices' sole safeguard is people’s belief in the authority of their capacity to make those decisions. Personal intimidation on top of eroding trust in courts may make judges think twice about decisions that go against the current administration, which is, of course, massively problematic for judicial review and for the political system.”

Intimidation Tactics

Kim Lane Scheppele, professor of social science and international affairs at the Ivy League school, 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 highlighted a wave of so-called “harassment deliveries” recently, in which judges have received unsolicited pizza deliveries with the customer listed as a name, the child of Judge Esther Salas, who was killed at the residence in several years ago by a gunman aiming at the judge.

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

“US justices are guarded by the Secret Service and the Marshals Service. And these are specialized law enforcement that are placed structurally inside the federal agency. And Pam Bondi has been leading the attacks on justices.”

Government Goals

On the government's aims, Scheppele said that “removing a federal judge is almost certainly not going to happen because it’s so hard to do. {Right now|Currently