Trump Supporters Back Bukele's Call for US President to Crack Down on American Judiciary

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

However, El Salvador's strongman president Nayib Bukele has adopted a distinct strategy by calling on the White House to follow his example in removing so-called “corrupt judges.”

His appeal for Trump to move against the US judiciary also received support from Trump allies, such as an X post by former supporter Elon Musk, who has in the past boosted the Salvadoran's demands to impeach US judges.

Growing Risks to Court Autonomy

Analysts note that the leader's latest remarks come at a time of unmatched dangers to court autonomy and individual judges in the US, and during a phase where the president's team is using comparable strong-arm methods used by rulers in nations such as Türkiye, Hungary, the Asian nation, and Bukele's own the Central American country to undermine government oversight.

The president's online statement last week was just the latest in a long series of taunts and claims he has leveled against the US's legal system, such as a spring assertion that the US was “experiencing a judicial coup,” and ridicule of a federal judge's ruling to stop deportation flights sending accused illegal immigrants to his country's brutal prison system.

Attacks on Federal Judge

The Salvadoran's demand for removal was also issued during online criticism on the state's federal judge Judge Immergut by presidential advisor Stephen Miller, attorney general Pam Bondi, Elon Musk, and the president himself in a latest media briefing.

Immergut had issued restraining orders preventing Trump from mobilizing the military reserves, first in the state then in California. Trump has been eager to dispatch soldiers into the city, which the leader has characterized as “battle-scarred” based on limited, non-violent demonstrations outside the city's federal building.

Record of Attacking Justices

Miller, Bondi, and Musk have a long record of criticizing judges who have ruled against presidential directives or in other ways hindered the administration's policy goals. Prior to resuming office recently, Trump urged his followers against judges overseeing his civil and criminal trials, who were then deluged with threats and harassment.

Watchdog organizations, law enforcement agencies, and the justices have pointed to a heightened climate of threats and coercion in the period since he re-entered the presidency.

Increasing Threat Statistics

According to data gathered by the US Marshals Service, in 2025 through the end of September, there were over five hundred incidents to nearly four hundred federal judges, leading to more than eight hundred investigations. This year has already surpassed 2022, and 2024, and is on track to top 2023's record of 630 threats.

The dangers are not only happening at the national level. Data from the university's research project shows that there have been at least fifty-nine instances of threats, harassment, stalking, or physical attacks committed against judges on the state and municipal levels in 2025.

Expert Analysis on Threat Sources

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

In spring, the Global Project Against Hate and Extremism (GPAHE) published a detailed report alleging that “malicious and reckless statements from Trump administration members and supporters align with rising violent posts on social media.” It noted “a fifty-four percent increase in demands for removal and physical intimidation against judges across digital networks from January to February 2025, the first full month of Trump’s administration.”

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

International Strongman Playbook

This progression towards authoritarianism has been well-trodden in the past decade in multiple countries, including by the Salvadoran.

In several years ago, right after starting a second term in the face of constitutional prohibitions, the president's parliamentary loyalists voted to remove the country’s top prosecutor and several justices on the supreme court. The judges, who had provoked his ire by rejecting pandemic policies, were replaced by replacements selected by Bukele.

The move echoed Viktor Orbán’s remodeling of the nation's judiciary several years back; Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s court cleanups in 2019; and attempts at comparable actions in the Middle Eastern state and Poland.

Undermining Judicial Independence

Analysts say that the threats and verbal assaults in the US can be viewed as efforts to undermine judicial independence in a structure that offers no easy way for the executive to remove judges Trump opposes.

Meghan Leonard, an associate professor at Illinois State University who has researched authoritarian backsliding in democracies, said the Trump administration had taken cues from the examples set by authoritarians 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 courts,” she said.

Citing examples such as Miller’s relentless claims of broad presidential authority, she noted: “They directly criticize the judiciary by repeating over and over 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: “Justices' only protection is people’s belief in the legitimacy of their capacity to make those rulings. Personal intimidation on top of eroding trust in courts may make judges hesitate about judgments that go against the sitting government, which is, of course, highly concerning for court oversight and for the political system.”

Intimidation Tactics

Kim Lane Scheppele, professor of social science and international affairs at the Ivy League school, 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 series of termed “harassment deliveries” this year, in which judges have received unsolicited food orders with the recipient listed as Daniel Anderl, the child of Judge Esther Salas, who was murdered 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.

“US justices are guarded by the Secret Service and the Marshals Service. And these are specialized police units that are placed institutionally inside the Department of Justice. And Pam Bondi has been spearheading the criticism on justices.”

Administration Aims

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