Maga Supporters Back Bukele's Call for US President to Target American Judges

Donald Trump rarely accepts counsel, particularly from foreign leaders who often attempt to flatter and compliment the American leader.

But, the Central American nation's authoritarian leader Nayib Bukele has followed a distinct approach by calling on the Trump administration to follow his example in removing what he terms “corrupt judges.”

His appeal for the president to move against the American court system also garnered backing from Trump allies, including an social media message by former supporter the billionaire, who has previously amplified the Salvadoran's calls to impeach US judges.

Unprecedented Risks to Court Autonomy

Experts say that the leader's latest remarks come at a time of unprecedented dangers to court autonomy and specific justices in the United States, and during a phase where the Trump administration is using similar authoritarian tactics used by rulers in nations such as Turkey, the European state, the Asian nation, and his native the Central American country to weaken government oversight.

Bukele's social media call recently was just the latest in a long series of taunts and claims he has made against the American judiciary, such as a spring claim that the US was “experiencing a judicial coup,” and his mockery of a federal judge's ruling to stop removal operations sending suspected illegal immigrants to his nation's harsh correctional facilities.

Criticism on Oregon Justice

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

The judge had ordered injunctions blocking the administration from deploying the military reserves, first in Oregon then in California. The president has been pushing to dispatch troops into Portland, which the leader has described as “war-ravaged” based on limited, peaceful protests outside the city's homeland security facility.

History of Attacking Justices

The advisor, Bondi, and the entrepreneur have a long record of attacking judges who have blocked Trump's executive orders or otherwise impeded the government's political agenda. Before resuming office this year, Trump directed his supporters against judges presiding over his civil and criminal trials, who were then inundated with intimidation and abuse.

Monitoring groups, law enforcement agencies, and judges themselves have highlighted a heightened climate of risks and intimidation in the months since he returned to the White House.

Increasing Risk Data

According to data collected by the US Marshals Service, in 2025 through the third quarter, there were over five hundred threats to 395 US justices, giving rise to 805 investigations. This year has already eclipsed the first recorded year, and 2024, and is likely to exceed 2023's high of 630 threats.

The dangers are not just happening at the federal level. Data from the university's Bridging Divides Initiative shows that there have been at least fifty-nine instances of threats, targeting, surveillance, or physical attacks committed against judges on the state and municipal levels in the current year.

Analyst Analysis on Root Causes

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

In May, the watchdog group published a detailed report alleging that “harmful and reckless statements from Trump administration members and allies align with escalating violent posts on online platforms.” It recorded “a fifty-four percent rise in calls for impeachment and physical intimidation against judges across digital networks from January to February of this year, the initial period of Trump’s administration.”

Heidi Beirich, the co-founder of GPAHE, said: “The president's warnings against judges have certainly fueled online vitriol at judges and calls for impeachment. Attacking the courts is another move in Trump’s advance towards strongman rule.”

Global Authoritarian Playbook

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

In 2021, immediately after commencing a new term in the face of legal bans, Bukele’s allies in congress voted to dismiss the country’s attorney general and five judges on the constitutional court. The justices, who had provoked his ire by ruling against pandemic policies, were replaced by replacements hand picked by the leader.

The action mirrored the Hungarian leader's remodeling of Hungary’s court system several years back; the Turkish president's judicial purges in 2019; and attempts at similar moves in the Middle Eastern state and the European country.

Undermining Judicial Independence

Experts explain that the intimidation and verbal assaults in the US can be seen as attempts to weaken court autonomy in a system that offers no easy way for the executive to remove judges Trump disapproves of.

Meghan Leonard, an associate professor at Illinois State University who has studied authoritarian backsliding in free nations, said the Trump administration had learned from the examples set by strongmen abroad.

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

Citing instances such as the advisor's persistent assertions of nearly limitless presidential authority, she added: “They directly criticize the courts by repeating over and over that it is not a equal branch in the government structure.

“They persist in redefine the debate by repeating their claim that the executive has more power than this other co-equal branch, which is not how checks and balances work.”

Leonard said: “Justices' only protection is public trust in the legitimacy of their capacity to make those decisions. Individual threats on top of weakening trust in courts may make judges think twice about decisions that go against the sitting government, which is, of course, highly concerning for court oversight and for democracy.”

Coercion Methods

Kim Lane Scheppele, academic of social science and global studies at Princeton University, has written about the use of “autocratic legalism” by the such as Orbán and Putin, and has warned about rising dangers to judges in the US.

She highlighted a wave of termed “harassment deliveries” recently, in which judges have received unwanted food orders with the customer listed as a name, the child of Justice Salas, who was killed at the residence 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 protected by the Secret Service and the federal police. And those are both dedicated police units that sit institutionally inside the federal agency. And Pam Bondi has been leading the criticism on federal judges.”

Administration Aims

Regarding the government's aims, 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