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The US President is not typically known for counsel, especially from international figures who often attempt to flatter and admire the American leader.

But, the Central American nation's strongman president Bukele has adopted a different approach by urging the White House to emulate his actions in removing so-called “corrupt judges.”

The call for the president to take action against the American court system also received backing from Trump allies, including an X post by former supporter the billionaire, who has previously boosted Bukele's demands to impeach US judges.

Unprecedented Risks to Court Autonomy

Experts note that Bukele's latest remarks occur of unmatched dangers to judicial independence and individual judges in the United States, and during a period where the president's team is employing comparable authoritarian tactics employed by leaders in countries such as Türkiye, the European state, the Asian nation, and Bukele's own the Central American country to weaken government oversight.

Bukele's online statement last week was just the latest in a string of provocations and allegations he has leveled against the US's legal system, including a spring assertion that the US was “facing a judicial coup,” and ridicule of a court's order to halt removal operations sending accused illegal immigrants to his nation's brutal correctional facilities.

Criticism on Oregon Justice

Bukele's demand for removal was also made during social media attacks on the state's justice Judge Immergut by presidential advisor Miller, attorney general Bondi, Musk, and the president himself in a latest media briefing.

The judge had issued restraining orders blocking Trump from mobilizing the military reserves, initially in the state then in California. Trump has been pushing to dispatch troops into the city, which the leader has described as “battle-scarred” based on small, peaceful demonstrations outside the urban federal building.

Record of Attacking Judges

Miller, the former AG, and the entrepreneur have a long record of attacking judges who have ruled against presidential directives or in other ways hindered the government's political agenda. Before resuming office this year, Trump urged his followers against judges presiding over his civil and criminal trials, who were then deluged with threats and harassment.

Watchdog organizations, police departments, and the justices have pointed to a heightened climate of threats and intimidation in the months since he returned to the presidency.

Rising Threat Statistics

According to information gathered by the federal agency, in 2025 through the end of September, there were 562 incidents to 395 US justices, leading to 805 investigations. 2025 has already eclipsed the first recorded year, and last year, and is likely to top the previous year's high of 630 threats.

The threats are not just happening at the federal level. Information by Princeton's Bridging Divides Initiative indicates that there have been at least 59 instances of intimidation, targeting, surveillance, or physical attacks directed against judges on the state and municipal levels in the current year.

Expert Insights on Threat Sources

Experts say that the threats are a product of the language coming from senior administration figures.

In May, the Global Project Against Hate and Extremism (GPAHE) published a comprehensive report alleging that “malicious and reckless statements from White House allies and allies align with rising aggressive posts on social media.” It recorded “a 54% increase in calls for impeachment and violent threats against judges across social media platforms from January to February of this year, the initial period of Trump’s administration.”

Heidi Beirich, the founder of the organization, said: “The president's threats against judges have definitely fueled online vitriol at judges and calls for ouster. Attacking the judiciary is one more step in Trump’s march towards strongman rule.”

International Authoritarian Tactics

That march towards autocracy has been common in recent years in multiple nations, including by Bukele.

In several years ago, right after starting a second term in the face of constitutional prohibitions, the president's allies in congress voted to dismiss the country’s attorney general and several judges on the supreme court. The justices, who had provoked his ire by rejecting coronavirus measures, were replaced by new appointees hand picked by Bukele.

The move echoed Viktor Orbán’s overhaul of the nation's judiciary in 2018; Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s judicial purges in 2019; and efforts at similar moves in the Middle Eastern state and Poland.

Undermining Court Autonomy

Analysts say that the threats and verbal assaults in the US can be viewed as efforts to weaken judicial independence in a structure that provides no simple method for the president to remove judges the administration disapproves of.

Meghan Leonard, an academic at Illinois State University who has researched democratic decline in democracies, said the Trump administration had taken cues from the examples set by strongmen abroad.

“The administration is observing at these achievements and failures. They know they’re not going to be able to enact any laws that would weaken the judiciary,” she said.

Pointing to instances such as Miller’s relentless assertions of broad executive power, she added: “They openly criticize the judiciary by stating repeatedly that it is not a equal branch in the government structure.

“They continue to 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' sole safeguard is public trust in the legitimacy of their ability to make those rulings. Individual threats on top of weakening trust in courts may make judges hesitate about decisions that go against the sitting government, which is, of course, massively problematic for court oversight and for the political system.”

Intimidation Tactics

Scheppele, academic of sociology and global studies at Princeton University, has documented the use of “autocratic legalism” by the such as Orbán and the Russian, and has warned about escalating dangers to judges in the US.

She highlighted a wave of termed “harassment deliveries” this year, in which judges have received unwanted food orders with the customer listed as a name, the son of Justice Salas, who was killed at the residence in several years ago by a assailant aiming at the judge.

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

“US justices are protected by the Secret Service and the Marshals Service. And these are specialized police units that are placed institutionally inside the federal agency. And Pam Bondi has been leading the criticism on justices.”

Administration Aims

Regarding the government's aims, the expert said that “impeaching a federal judge is highly not going to happen because it’s so hard to do. {Right now|Currently