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The US President is not typically known for counsel, particularly from foreign leaders who frequently attempt to praise and compliment the US president.

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

The call for Trump to move against the American court system also garnered support from Trump allies, such as an X post by one-time supporter the billionaire, who has previously amplified Bukele's demands to oust US judges.

Growing Risks to Court Autonomy

Experts note that the leader's recent intervention occur of unprecedented threats to judicial independence and individual judges in the US, and during a period where the president's team is using comparable strong-arm methods used by rulers in nations such as Turkey, Hungary, India, and Bukele's own El Salvador to undermine government oversight.

The president's social media call recently was just the latest in a long series of taunts and allegations he has leveled against the American judiciary, including a March claim that the US was “facing a judicial coup,” and ridicule of a federal judge's ruling to halt deportation flights transporting accused undocumented individuals to his country's brutal correctional facilities.

Criticism on Oregon Justice

The Salvadoran's impeachment call was also issued amid social media attacks on the state's federal judge Karin Immergut by White House aide Stephen Miller, former AG Pam Bondi, Elon Musk, and the president personally in a recent media briefing.

Immergut had issued restraining orders blocking the administration from deploying the national guard, first in the state then in California. The president has been eager to dispatch soldiers into Portland, which the leader has characterized as “war-ravaged” based on small, non-violent demonstrations outside the urban homeland security facility.

Record of Targeting Justices

The advisor, the former AG, and the entrepreneur have a long record of criticizing judges who have ruled against presidential directives or otherwise hindered the administration's policy goals. Before resuming office this year, the president directed his supporters against judges overseeing his civil and criminal trials, who were then inundated with intimidation and harassment.

Monitoring groups, police departments, and judges themselves have highlighted a heightened climate of threats and coercion in the period since he returned to the presidency.

Rising Risk Data

Based on data collected 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, giving rise to 805 inquiries. This year has already eclipsed 2022, and last year, and is likely to top 2023's high of 630 threats.

The dangers are not only happening at the federal level. Information by Princeton's Bridging Divides Initiative indicates that there have been at least 59 cases of threats, targeting, stalking, or violence committed against judges on the state and municipal levels in the current year.

Analyst Insights on Threat Sources

Specialists state that the intimidation are a product of the language coming from senior administration figures.

In spring, the Global Project Against Hate and Extremism (GPAHE) published a detailed report claiming that “harmful and reckless statements from White House allies and supporters align with rising violent posts on online platforms.” It recorded “a 54% increase in calls for removal and physical intimidation against judges across social media platforms from January to February of this year, the initial period of Trump’s administration.”

Beirich, the co-founder of GPAHE, said: “Trump’s threats against judges have definitely driven online vitriol at judges and calls for impeachment. Attacking the courts is another move in Trump’s march towards strongman rule.”

Global Authoritarian Tactics

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

In 2021, right after commencing a new term despite legal bans, the president's allies in congress voted to dismiss the nation's attorney general and five justices on the constitutional court. The justices, who had provoked his ire by ruling against coronavirus measures, made way for new appointees selected by the leader.

The move mirrored the Hungarian leader's overhaul of the nation's judiciary in 2018; Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s judicial purges recently; and efforts at similar moves in Israel and the European country.

Weakening Judicial Independence

Experts say that the intimidation and rhetorical attacks in the US can be seen as efforts to weaken judicial independence in a system that provides no simple method for the executive to remove judges Trump disapproves of.

Meghan Leonard, an academic at Illinois State University who has studied authoritarian backsliding in free nations, said the White House had learned from the examples set by authoritarians abroad.

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

Pointing to instances such as the advisor's persistent claims of broad executive power, she added: “They openly attack the courts by stating repeatedly that it is not a equal branch in the separation of powers.

“They persist in reframe the debate by emphasizing their argument that the executive has greater authority than this judicial branch, which is not how checks and balances work.”

Leonard said: “Justices' sole safeguard is people’s belief in the authority of their ability to make those decisions. Individual threats on top of eroding trust in courts may make judges hesitate about judgments that go against the current administration, which is, of course, massively problematic for judicial review and for democracy.”

Intimidation Tactics

Scheppele, professor of social science and global studies at the Ivy League school, has written about the use of “autocratic legalism” by the likes of the Hungarian and Putin, and has spoken out about escalating threats to judges in the US.

She pointed to a series of termed “pizza doxxings” recently, in which judges have received unwanted food orders with the customer listed as a name, the son of Judge Esther Salas, who was murdered at the residence in several years ago by a assailant aiming at Salas.

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

“US justices are guarded by the presidential protection and the Marshals Service. And those are both specialized police units that sit institutionally inside the federal agency. And Pam Bondi has been leading the criticism on federal judges.”

Administration Aims

On the administration’s objectives, Scheppele said that “impeaching a federal judge is almost certainly not going to happen because it’s very difficult to do. {Right now|Currently