Maga Supporters Back El Salvador Leader's Call for US President to Target American Judiciary

Donald Trump rarely accepts guidance, especially from foreign leaders who often seek to praise and admire the US president.

However, El Salvador's strongman president Bukele has adopted a distinct approach by urging the White House to emulate his actions in removing so-called “dishonest judges.”

His appeal for the president to take action against the US judiciary also received support from Maga figures, including an social media message by former close Trump ally Elon Musk, who has in the past amplified Bukele's demands to oust US judges.

Unprecedented Threats to Court Autonomy

Analysts note that Bukele's latest remarks come at a time of unprecedented threats to judicial independence and individual judges in the United States, and during a phase where the president's team is employing similar strong-arm tactics employed by leaders in nations such as Turkey, Hungary, the Asian nation, and his native El Salvador to weaken government oversight.

The president's online call last week 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 court's order to stop deportation flights sending suspected undocumented individuals to his country's harsh prison system.

Criticism on Oregon Justice

The Salvadoran's demand for removal was also issued during online attacks on the state's federal judge Karin Immergut by presidential advisor Stephen Miller, attorney general Pam Bondi, Musk, and Trump himself in a latest press gaggle.

The judge had issued restraining orders blocking the administration from mobilizing the military reserves, initially in Oregon then in California. The president has been pushing to send troops into the city, which the president has described as “battle-scarred” based on small, peaceful protests outside the urban homeland security facility.

Record of Targeting Judges

Miller, the former AG, and the entrepreneur have a history of attacking judges who have blocked Trump's executive orders or in other ways impeded the administration's political agenda. Before returning to power recently, Trump urged his followers against judges overseeing his civil and criminal trials, who were then inundated with threats and harassment.

Watchdog organizations, law enforcement agencies, and judges themselves have highlighted a heightened atmosphere of risks and intimidation in the months since he re-entered the presidency.

Rising Risk Data

Based on information collected by the federal agency, in 2025 through the third quarter, there were over five hundred threats to nearly four hundred federal judges, leading to more than eight hundred inquiries. This year has already eclipsed 2022, and 2024, and is on track to exceed the previous year's record of over six hundred reported incidents.

The dangers are not just happening at the national level. Information by Princeton's research project indicates that there have been at least fifty-nine instances of intimidation, harassment, stalking, or physical attacks committed against judges on the state and municipal levels in 2025.

Analyst Insights on Threat Sources

Specialists say that the threats are a product of the rhetoric coming from senior administration figures.

In spring, the watchdog group published a detailed report alleging that “malicious and highly irresponsible statements from Trump administration members and allies align with escalating aggressive posts on online platforms.” It recorded “a 54% increase in demands for impeachment and violent threats against judges across social media platforms from January to February 2025, the first full month of the president's term.”

Beirich, the founder of GPAHE, said: “The president's warnings against judges have certainly driven digital abuse at judges and demands for impeachment. Targeting the judiciary is one more step in the administration's march towards authoritarianism.”

Global Authoritarian Tactics

That march towards autocracy has been well-trodden in the past decade in multiple nations, such as by the Salvadoran.

In 2021, immediately after commencing a second term in the face of constitutional prohibitions, Bukele’s parliamentary loyalists voted to dismiss the nation's top prosecutor and five judges on the constitutional court. The judges, who had provoked his ire by rejecting pandemic policies, were replaced by replacements selected by Bukele.

The action mirrored the Hungarian leader's overhaul of Hungary’s court system in 2018; the Turkish president's court cleanups in 2019; and efforts at comparable actions in the Middle Eastern state and Poland.

Undermining Court Autonomy

Analysts say that the intimidation and verbal assaults in the US can be seen as attempts to weaken judicial independence in a system that offers no easy way for the executive to dismiss judges Trump opposes.

Leonard, an associate professor at the university who has researched authoritarian backsliding in free nations, said the Trump administration had learned from the models set by strongmen abroad.

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

Citing examples such as Miller’s persistent assertions of broad presidential authority, she noted: “They directly attack the judiciary by repeating repeatedly that it is not a equal branch in the separation of powers.

“They continue to redefine the debate by repeating their argument that the executive has more power than this judicial branch, which is not how separation powers work.”

The professor said: “Justices' only protection is public trust in the legitimacy of their ability to make those rulings. Personal intimidation 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 democracy.”

Intimidation Tactics

Scheppele, professor of social science and international affairs at the Ivy League school, has documented the use of “authoritarian law” by the such as Orbán and the Russian, and has warned about rising threats to judges in the US.

She pointed to a series of termed “harassment deliveries” this year, in which judges have received unwanted food orders with the recipient listed as Daniel Anderl, the son of Justice Salas, who was murdered at the judge’s home in 2020 by a assailant aiming at the judge.

“Everyone understands what it means. ‘We know where you live. You are a target,’” the professor said.

“US justices are guarded by the presidential protection and the Marshals Service. And those are both dedicated law enforcement that sit institutionally inside the Department of Justice. And Pam Bondi has been spearheading the attacks on justices.”

Government Goals

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