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The US President rarely accepts guidance, particularly from international figures who often seek to flatter and compliment the US president.

But, the Central American nation's authoritarian leader Nayib Bukele has followed a distinct strategy by calling on the Trump administration to follow his example in impeaching so-called “dishonest judges.”

The call for Trump to move against the American court system also garnered support from Maga figures, including an X post by former supporter the billionaire, who has previously amplified Bukele's demands to impeach US judges.

Unprecedented Threats to Judicial Independence

Experts note that the leader's recent remarks occur of unprecedented dangers to judicial independence and individual judges in the United States, and during a phase where the president's team is using similar authoritarian tactics used by rulers in nations such as Turkey, Hungary, the Asian nation, and his native the Central American country to undermine democratic accountability.

Bukele's online statement recently was one more in a string of provocations and claims he has leveled against the US's legal system, including a spring claim that the US was “facing a court takeover,” and his mockery of a court's ruling to stop deportation flights sending accused illegal immigrants to his country's brutal correctional facilities.

Attacks on Oregon Justice

Bukele's impeachment call was also issued during online attacks on the state's federal judge Karin Immergut by presidential advisor Stephen Miller, attorney general Pam Bondi, Musk, and Trump personally in a latest media briefing.

Immergut had issued injunctions preventing Trump from mobilizing the military reserves, initially in the state then in the West Coast state. The president has been pushing to send troops into the city, which the leader has described as “war-ravaged” based on small, non-violent protests outside the urban homeland security facility.

History of Targeting Judges

The advisor, Bondi, and Musk have a history of criticizing judges who have blocked presidential directives or otherwise impeded the administration's political agenda. Before returning to power recently, the president urged his supporters against judges presiding over his legal cases, who were then deluged with threats and abuse.

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

Rising Threat Statistics

Based on data gathered by the federal agency, in the current year through the end of September, there were over five hundred threats to nearly four hundred federal judges, leading to more than eight hundred investigations. This year has already surpassed the first recorded year, and 2024, and is on track to exceed the previous year's high of over six hundred threats.

The dangers are not just happening at the national level. Data from Princeton's research project indicates that there have been at least 59 cases of intimidation, harassment, surveillance, or physical attacks directed against judges on the state and municipal levels in 2025.

Analyst Analysis on Root Causes

Experts say that the intimidation are a result of the rhetoric coming from top government officials.

In May, the Global Project Against Hate and Extremism (GPAHE) published a detailed report claiming that “malicious and highly irresponsible statements from Trump administration members and allies align with escalating aggressive posts on social media.” It recorded “a 54% increase in calls for impeachment and physical intimidation against judges across digital networks from the first two months 2025, the initial period of Trump’s administration.”

Beirich, the co-founder of the organization, said: “The president's threats against judges have definitely driven online vitriol at judges and calls for impeachment. Targeting the courts is one more step in Trump’s march towards authoritarianism.”

International Authoritarian Playbook

This progression towards authoritarianism has been common in the past decade in several countries, such as by the Salvadoran.

In several years ago, immediately after commencing a second term despite legal bans, the president's allies in congress voted to remove the country’s top prosecutor and several judges on the constitutional court. The justices, who had angered him by ruling against coronavirus measures, made way for new appointees hand picked by the leader.

The action mirrored the Hungarian leader's remodeling of the nation's judiciary several years back; Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s judicial purges in 2019; and attempts at similar moves in the Middle Eastern state and Poland.

Undermining Court Autonomy

Experts explain that the threats and rhetorical attacks in the US can be viewed as attempts to weaken judicial independence in a system 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 democratic decline in free nations, 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 legislation that would undermine the courts,” she said.

Citing examples such as the advisor's persistent claims of nearly limitless executive power, she noted: “They openly attack the judiciary by repeating over and over that it is not a equal branch in the government structure.

“They persist in reframe the debate by repeating 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 people’s belief in the authority of their ability to make those rulings. Individual threats on top of eroding institutional legitimacy may make judges hesitate about judgments that go against the sitting government, which is, of course, massively problematic for judicial review and for democracy.”

Coercion Methods

Scheppele, professor of sociology and global studies at the Ivy League school, has documented the use of “autocratic legalism” by the likes of the Hungarian and the Russian, and has warned about rising dangers to judges in the US.

She highlighted a series of so-called “harassment deliveries” this year, in which judges have received unwanted food orders with the recipient listed as a name, the child of Judge Esther Salas, who was killed at the judge’s home in 2020 by a assailant aiming at the judge.

“Everyone knows what it means. ‘We know where you live. We’re coming for you,’” Scheppele said.

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

Government Goals

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