Trump Figures Back Bukele's Call for US President to Target American Judges

Donald Trump does not usually take advice, especially from foreign leaders who frequently seek to praise and compliment the US president.

However, the Central American nation's strongman president Nayib Bukele has adopted a distinct strategy by calling on the Trump administration to follow his example in removing so-called “dishonest judges.”

His appeal for Trump to move against the US judiciary also received support from Maga figures, including an X post by former close Trump ally Elon Musk, who has in the past boosted Bukele's calls to oust US judges.

Unprecedented Risks to Court Autonomy

Analysts note that Bukele's recent remarks occur of unprecedented threats to court autonomy and individual judges in the US, and during a period where the Trump administration is using similar authoritarian tactics used by rulers in nations such as Türkiye, Hungary, the Asian nation, and Bukele's own El Salvador to weaken government oversight.

Bukele's online statement last week was one more in a string of provocations and claims he has leveled against the US's legal system, including a March assertion that the US was “experiencing a court takeover,” and ridicule of a court's order to halt deportation flights transporting accused illegal immigrants to his nation's harsh correctional facilities.

Criticism on Federal Judge

The Salvadoran's demand for removal was also issued during social media criticism on Oregon justice Karin Immergut by presidential advisor Miller, former AG Bondi, Musk, and Trump himself in a recent press gaggle.

The judge had ordered injunctions preventing Trump from mobilizing the national guard, initially in Oregon then in California. Trump has been pushing to dispatch troops into Portland, which the president has characterized as “battle-scarred” based on limited, non-violent demonstrations outside the urban federal building.

History of Targeting Judges

The advisor, Bondi, and the entrepreneur have a history of attacking judges who have blocked presidential directives or in other ways hindered the government's political agenda. Before resuming office this year, Trump urged his followers against judges overseeing his legal cases, who were then deluged with threats and harassment.

Watchdog organizations, police departments, and the justices have pointed to a increased atmosphere of threats and intimidation in the months since he re-entered the White House.

Rising Risk Data

Based on data collected by the federal agency, in the current year through the third quarter, there were 562 threats to 395 federal judges, leading to more than eight hundred investigations. This year has already eclipsed the first recorded year, and last year, and is on track to exceed the previous year's high of over six hundred reported incidents.

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

Expert Insights on Threat Sources

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

In May, the Global Project Against Hate and Extremism (GPAHE) published a detailed report alleging that “harmful and reckless statements from Trump administration members and allies coincide with escalating aggressive posts on social media.” It noted “a 54% increase in calls for impeachment and physical intimidation against judges across digital networks from January to February of this year, the first full month of Trump’s administration.”

Heidi Beirich, the founder of GPAHE, said: “The president's warnings against judges have definitely fueled digital abuse at judges and demands for impeachment. Targeting the courts is one more step in the administration's march towards strongman rule.”

International Authoritarian Playbook

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

In 2021, immediately after starting a second term in the face of legal bans, Bukele’s allies in congress voted to remove the country’s top prosecutor and several judges on the supreme court. The judges, who had angered him by ruling against coronavirus measures, were replaced by replacements selected by the leader.

The action mirrored the Hungarian leader's remodeling of Hungary’s court system in 2018; Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s judicial purges in 2019; and efforts at comparable actions in the Middle Eastern state and the European country.

Weakening Court Autonomy

Analysts explain that the intimidation 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 president to dismiss judges the administration disapproves of.

Leonard, an associate professor at the university who has researched democratic decline in democracies, said the Trump administration had taken cues from the examples set by strongmen overseas.

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

Pointing to examples such as the advisor's persistent claims of nearly limitless presidential authority, she noted: “They directly criticize the judiciary by repeating over and over that it is not a equal branch in the separation of powers.

“They persist in reframe the discussion by repeating their argument that the executive has greater authority than this other co-equal branch, which is not how checks and balances work.”

The professor said: “Judges' sole safeguard is public trust in the legitimacy of their capacity to make those rulings. Personal intimidation on top of eroding institutional legitimacy may make judges hesitate about decisions that go against the sitting government, which is, of course, highly concerning for judicial review and for the political system.”

Coercion Methods

Kim Lane Scheppele, academic of sociology and global studies at the Ivy League school, has documented the use of “authoritarian law” by the such as Orbán and Putin, and has warned about escalating threats to judges in the US.

She highlighted a series of so-called “pizza doxxings” this year, in which judges have received unwanted food orders with the recipient listed as a name, the child of Judge Esther Salas, who was killed at the judge’s home in several years ago by a assailant targeting Salas.

“Everyone understands what it means. ‘Your address is known. You are a target,’” the professor said.

“Federal judges are guarded by the Secret Service and the federal police. And these are dedicated law enforcement that sit institutionally inside the Department of Justice. And the former AG has been leading the attacks on federal judges.”

Government Goals

Regarding the government's objectives, the expert said that “impeaching a US justice is almost certainly not going to happen because it’s very difficult to do. {Right now|Currently