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Donald Trump is not typically known for advice, particularly from foreign leaders who often seek to flatter and compliment the US president.

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

His appeal for Trump to take action against the American court system also garnered backing from Trump allies, such as an social media message by one-time supporter the billionaire, who has previously boosted the Salvadoran's calls to oust US judges.

Unprecedented Risks to Court Autonomy

Analysts note that the leader's latest remarks come at a time of unprecedented dangers to judicial independence and specific justices in the US, and during a phase where the Trump administration is using comparable authoritarian methods employed by rulers in nations such as Türkiye, Hungary, India, and his native El Salvador to undermine government oversight.

Bukele's social media call last week was one more in a long series of provocations and claims he has made against the US's legal system, including a spring assertion that the US was “facing a judicial coup,” and his mockery of a court's ruling to stop removal operations sending accused undocumented individuals to his nation's harsh prison system.

Criticism on Federal Judge

Bukele's demand for removal was also issued amid social media attacks on the state's justice Karin Immergut by White House aide Miller, attorney general Pam Bondi, Elon Musk, and the president personally in a latest press gaggle.

Immergut had ordered restraining orders preventing Trump from deploying the military reserves, initially in the state then in California. Trump has been eager to send troops into the city, which the president has described as “battle-scarred” based on limited, peaceful protests outside the urban federal building.

Record of Attacking Judges

The advisor, Bondi, and Musk have a long record of criticizing judges who have blocked Trump's executive orders or in other ways hindered the government's political agenda. Prior to returning to power this year, Trump urged his followers against judges overseeing his legal cases, who were then deluged with threats and harassment.

Monitoring groups, police departments, and judges themselves have pointed to a increased atmosphere of risks and coercion in the period since he returned to the White House.

Increasing Risk Data

According to information collected by the federal agency, in 2025 through the end of September, there were 562 threats to 395 US justices, leading to 805 inquiries. This year has already eclipsed the first recorded year, and last year, and is likely to top the previous year's record of over six hundred threats.

The threats are not just happening at the national level. Data from the university's Bridging Divides Initiative shows that there have been at least fifty-nine cases of threats, harassment, stalking, or violence committed against judges on the local level in the current year.

Analyst Analysis on Threat Sources

Experts say that the intimidation are a result of the rhetoric coming from senior administration figures.

In May, the watchdog group published a comprehensive report claiming that “malicious and highly irresponsible statements from Trump administration members and supporters align with escalating aggressive posts on online platforms.” It recorded “a 54% increase in demands for impeachment and physical intimidation against judges across digital networks from the first two months of this year, the initial period of the president's term.”

Heidi Beirich, the co-founder of the organization, said: “Trump’s threats against judges have definitely fueled digital abuse at judges and demands for impeachment. Targeting the courts is another move in the administration's march towards strongman rule.”

International Authoritarian Tactics

This progression towards authoritarianism has been common in recent years in multiple nations, such as by the Salvadoran.

In several years ago, immediately after commencing a new term despite constitutional prohibitions, Bukele’s allies in congress voted to remove the country’s attorney general and five judges on the constitutional court. The justices, who had angered him by rejecting pandemic policies, made way for new appointees selected by Bukele.

The move mirrored the Hungarian leader's remodeling of the nation's judiciary in 2018; Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s judicial purges in 2019; and efforts at comparable actions in Israel and Poland.

Undermining Judicial Independence

Analysts explain that the intimidation and rhetorical attacks in the US can be seen as efforts to weaken judicial independence in a system that offers no easy way for the executive to remove judges the administration disapproves of.

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

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

Citing instances such as Miller’s relentless assertions of nearly limitless executive power, she noted: “They directly criticize the courts by stating over and over that it is not a co-equal branch in the separation of powers.

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

The professor said: “Judges' only protection is people’s belief in the legitimacy of their capacity to make those decisions. Personal intimidation on top of eroding institutional legitimacy may make judges hesitate about decisions that go against the sitting government, which is, of course, massively problematic for judicial review and for democracy.”

Coercion Methods

Kim Lane Scheppele, professor of sociology and international affairs at Princeton University, has written about the use of “authoritarian law” by the such as the Hungarian and the Russian, and has warned about rising dangers to judges in the US.

She highlighted a wave of so-called “pizza doxxings” this year, in which judges have received unsolicited pizza deliveries with the customer listed as Daniel Anderl, the child of Justice Salas, who was killed at the judge’s home in several years ago by a gunman aiming at the judge.

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

“Federal judges are guarded by the Secret Service and the federal police. And these are dedicated law enforcement that are placed institutionally inside the federal agency. And Pam Bondi has been spearheading the attacks on federal judges.”

Administration Aims

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