Maga Supporters Endorse Bukele's Plea for Trump to Crack Down on American Judiciary

The US President does not usually take advice, particularly from foreign leaders who often attempt to flatter and admire the American leader.

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

The call for the president to take action against the US judiciary also received backing from Trump allies, such as an social media message by one-time close Trump ally the billionaire, who has previously boosted Bukele's calls to oust US judges.

Unprecedented Risks to Judicial Independence

Analysts say that Bukele's latest intervention come at a time of unprecedented dangers to judicial independence and specific justices in the US, and during a period where the president's team is employing similar strong-arm tactics used by rulers in nations such as Turkey, the European state, the Asian nation, and his native El Salvador to weaken government oversight.

Bukele's online call recently was just the latest in a long series of provocations and allegations he has leveled against the US's legal system, such as a March assertion that the US was “experiencing a court takeover,” and his mockery of a federal judge's order to stop deportation flights transporting accused illegal immigrants to his country's brutal correctional facilities.

Attacks on Oregon Justice

Bukele's impeachment call was also issued during social media attacks on the state's justice Judge Immergut by White House aide Stephen Miller, former AG Pam Bondi, Musk, and Trump himself in a latest media briefing.

Immergut had ordered injunctions preventing the administration from deploying the military reserves, initially in Oregon then in California. Trump has been eager to send troops into the city, which the leader has described as “battle-scarred” based on small, non-violent demonstrations outside the urban homeland security facility.

History of Attacking Judges

The advisor, Bondi, and the entrepreneur have a history of criticizing judges who have ruled against Trump's executive orders or in other ways hindered the government's political agenda. Before resuming office this year, Trump urged his followers against judges presiding over his legal cases, who were then deluged with threats and harassment.

Monitoring groups, law enforcement agencies, and the justices have pointed to a increased climate of risks and intimidation in the months since he returned to the presidency.

Increasing Risk Data

According to information gathered by the US Marshals Service, in the current year through the third quarter, there were over five hundred incidents to nearly four hundred US justices, giving rise to more than eight hundred investigations. 2025 has already surpassed the first recorded year, and 2024, and is on track to exceed 2023's record of over six hundred threats.

The dangers are not only happening at the national level. Information by Princeton's Bridging Divides Initiative indicates that there have been at least 59 cases of intimidation, harassment, surveillance, or physical attacks committed against judges on the local level in 2025.

Expert Analysis on Threat Sources

Specialists state that the threats are a result of the language coming from senior administration figures.

In May, the watchdog group published a comprehensive report alleging that “harmful and highly irresponsible statements from Trump administration members and supporters coincide with escalating violent posts on social media.” It recorded “a fifty-four percent increase in calls for removal and physical intimidation against judges across digital networks from the first two months 2025, the first full month of the president's term.”

Beirich, the founder of the organization, said: “Trump’s warnings against judges have definitely fueled digital abuse at judges and calls for ouster. Targeting the judiciary is another move in the administration's advance towards strongman rule.”

Global Strongman Playbook

That march towards authoritarianism has been well-trodden in recent years in multiple nations, including by Bukele.

In 2021, immediately after commencing a second term despite constitutional prohibitions, Bukele’s allies in congress voted to dismiss the country’s attorney general and several judges on the supreme court. The judges, who had provoked his ire by ruling against pandemic policies, were replaced by new appointees selected by the leader.

The action echoed Viktor Orbán’s overhaul of the nation's judiciary several years back; the Turkish president's judicial purges in 2019; and attempts at comparable actions in the Middle Eastern state and the European country.

Weakening Court Autonomy

Analysts explain that the threats and verbal assaults in the US can be seen as efforts to weaken judicial independence in a structure that provides no simple method for the president to dismiss judges the administration opposes.

Leonard, an associate professor at Illinois State University who has researched democratic decline in democracies, said the White House had taken cues from the examples set by strongmen abroad.

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

Citing examples such as the advisor's relentless claims of broad presidential authority, she noted: “They directly attack the judiciary by repeating over and over that it is not a equal branch in the separation of powers.

“They persist in redefine the discussion by repeating 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' only protection is people’s belief in the legitimacy of their ability to make those decisions. Personal intimidation on top of eroding trust in courts may make judges hesitate about decisions that go against the sitting government, which is, of course, massively problematic for judicial review and for democracy.”

Intimidation Tactics

Scheppele, professor of sociology and international affairs at Princeton University, has written about the use of “authoritarian law” by the likes of the Hungarian and Putin, and has spoken out about escalating threats to judges in the US.

She pointed to a wave of termed “pizza doxxings” recently, in which judges have received unsolicited food orders with the customer listed as Daniel Anderl, the child of Judge Esther Salas, who was killed at the residence in 2020 by a gunman aiming at the judge.

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

“Federal judges are guarded by the presidential protection and the federal police. And those are both specialized law enforcement that are placed structurally inside the federal agency. And Pam Bondi has been spearheading the criticism on justices.”

Administration Aims

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