🔗 Share this article

Donald Trump is not typically known for counsel, especially from foreign leaders who frequently seek to flatter and admire the US president.

However, El Salvador's strongman president Nayib Bukele has followed a different approach by calling on the Trump administration to follow his example in impeaching so-called “corrupt judges.”

The call for Trump to move against the US judiciary also garnered backing from Trump allies, such as an X post by former close Trump ally the billionaire, who has in the past boosted the Salvadoran's demands to impeach US judges.

Unprecedented Risks to Judicial Independence

Experts note that Bukele's latest intervention come at a time of unprecedented dangers to court autonomy and specific justices in the US, and during a phase where the Trump administration is employing similar strong-arm methods employed by rulers in countries such as Türkiye, the European state, the Asian nation, and Bukele's own the Central American country to weaken government oversight.

The president's online call recently was just the latest in a string of provocations and allegations he has made against the American judiciary, including a spring claim that the US was “experiencing a court takeover,” and ridicule of a court's ruling to halt deportation flights transporting suspected illegal immigrants to his nation's harsh prison system.

Attacks on Oregon Justice

Bukele's demand for removal was also made during social media criticism on Oregon federal judge Karin Immergut by White House aide Miller, attorney general Bondi, Musk, and the president personally in a latest press gaggle.

Immergut had ordered restraining orders blocking the administration from mobilizing the military reserves, initially in Oregon then in California. The president has been eager to dispatch soldiers into Portland, which the leader has described as “battle-scarred” based on small, peaceful protests outside the urban homeland security facility.

History of Targeting Judges

The advisor, Bondi, and the entrepreneur have a history of attacking judges who have ruled against presidential directives or in other ways hindered the government's political agenda. Prior to returning to power this year, the president urged his followers against judges presiding over his civil and criminal trials, who were then deluged with threats and abuse.

Watchdog organizations, police departments, and judges themselves have pointed to a increased climate of risks and coercion in the period since he re-entered the White House.

Increasing Threat Statistics

Based on information gathered by the federal agency, in the current year through the end of September, there were 562 incidents to nearly four hundred federal judges, leading to more than eight hundred investigations. This year has already eclipsed 2022, and last year, and is likely to top 2023's record of 630 reported incidents.

The threats are not just happening at the national level. Information by the university's research project indicates that there have been at least fifty-nine instances of threats, targeting, surveillance, or violence directed against judges on the local level in the current year.

Expert Analysis on Root Causes

Specialists say that the threats are a product 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 Trump administration members and allies align with escalating violent posts on social media.” It noted “a 54% rise in demands for impeachment and violent threats against judges across digital networks from January to February 2025, the first full month of Trump’s administration.”

Beirich, the co-founder of the organization, said: “Trump’s warnings against judges have definitely driven digital abuse at judges and demands for ouster. Targeting the courts is one more step in the administration's march towards strongman rule.”

Global Strongman Tactics

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

In 2021, immediately after starting a new term in the face of legal bans, Bukele’s parliamentary loyalists voted to remove the nation's top prosecutor and several judges on the constitutional court. The judges, who had provoked his ire by rejecting pandemic policies, were replaced by replacements selected by Bukele.

The action echoed the Hungarian leader's remodeling of the nation's judiciary in 2018; the Turkish president's judicial purges in 2019; and attempts at similar moves in Israel and the European country.

Weakening Court Autonomy

Analysts say that the threats and rhetorical attacks in the US can be seen as attempts to weaken judicial independence in a structure that provides no simple method for the president to dismiss judges Trump opposes.

Meghan Leonard, an associate professor at Illinois State University who has studied authoritarian backsliding in democracies, said the Trump administration had learned from the models set by authoritarians abroad.

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

Citing examples such as the advisor's relentless assertions of nearly limitless executive power, she added: “They openly attack the courts by repeating over and over that it is not a co-equal branch in the government structure.

“They persist in reframe the discussion by repeating their claim that the executive has greater authority than this other co-equal branch, which is not how separation powers work.”

Leonard said: “Judges' sole safeguard is public trust in the authority 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 current administration, which is, of course, massively problematic for judicial review and for the political system.”

Coercion Methods

Kim Lane Scheppele, academic of sociology and global studies at the Ivy League school, has documented the use of “autocratic legalism” by the such as Orbán and the Russian, and has spoken out about escalating dangers to judges in the US.

She pointed to a series of so-called “pizza doxxings” this year, in which judges have received unwanted food orders with the recipient listed as Daniel Anderl, the son of Justice Salas, who was killed at the judge’s home in several years ago by a assailant aiming at the judge.

“Everyone understands what it means. ‘Your address is known. We’re coming for you,’” the professor said.

“US justices are guarded by the presidential protection and the federal police. And these are dedicated law enforcement that are placed structurally inside the Department of Justice. And the former AG has been leading the criticism on federal judges.”

Administration Aims

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