Maga Supporters Back Bukele's Plea for Trump to Target US Judges

The US President does not usually take counsel, especially from foreign leaders who often attempt to praise and compliment the American leader.

However, the Central American nation's authoritarian leader Nayib Bukele has adopted a distinct approach by calling on the Trump administration to emulate his actions in impeaching so-called “dishonest judges.”

His appeal for Trump to move against the American court system also garnered support from Maga figures, including an X post by former supporter the billionaire, who has previously boosted Bukele's calls to oust US judges.

Growing Threats to Court Autonomy

Analysts note that Bukele's latest remarks occur of unmatched threats to court autonomy and specific justices in the United States, and during a period where the Trump administration is using similar strong-arm tactics employed by rulers in countries such as Turkey, Hungary, the Asian nation, and his native the Central American country to weaken democratic accountability.

The president's online statement last week was one more in a string of provocations and claims he has made against the US's legal system, including a March assertion that the US was “facing a court takeover,” and his mockery of a court's order to halt deportation flights transporting accused illegal immigrants to his country's brutal correctional facilities.

Criticism on Oregon Justice

The Salvadoran's impeachment call was also issued amid social media attacks on Oregon justice Judge Immergut by presidential advisor Miller, former AG Pam Bondi, Elon Musk, and the president personally in a latest media briefing.

The judge had issued injunctions blocking Trump from deploying the national guard, initially in the state then in California. Trump has been eager to dispatch troops into Portland, which the president has characterized as “battle-scarred” based on small, peaceful protests outside the city's homeland security facility.

History of Attacking Judges

Miller, Bondi, and Musk have a history of attacking judges who have ruled against presidential directives or in other ways impeded the government's political agenda. Before returning to power this year, the president 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 the justices have highlighted a heightened climate of risks and intimidation in the period since he re-entered the presidency.

Increasing Risk Data

Based on data gathered by the US Marshals Service, in 2025 through the end of September, there were 562 threats to nearly four hundred federal judges, leading to more than eight hundred investigations. 2025 has already eclipsed the first recorded year, and 2024, and is likely to exceed the previous year's high of over six hundred reported incidents.

The threats are not only happening at the national level. Information by Princeton's Bridging Divides Initiative indicates that there have been at least fifty-nine cases of intimidation, targeting, stalking, or physical attacks directed against judges on the local level in the current year.

Expert Insights on Threat Sources

Experts state that the threats are a product of the language coming from top government officials.

In May, the Global Project Against Hate and Extremism (GPAHE) published a comprehensive report claiming that “malicious and reckless statements from White House allies and supporters coincide with rising aggressive posts on online platforms.” It recorded “a fifty-four percent rise in demands for impeachment and violent threats against judges across social media platforms from the first two months 2025, the first full month of Trump’s administration.”

Heidi Beirich, the co-founder of the organization, said: “Trump’s threats against judges have certainly fueled digital abuse at judges and demands for ouster. Attacking the courts is one more step in the administration's march towards authoritarianism.”

International Authoritarian Tactics

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

In 2021, immediately after starting a second term despite legal bans, Bukele’s allies in congress voted to remove the country’s top prosecutor and several justices on the supreme court. The justices, who had angered him by rejecting pandemic policies, were replaced by new appointees selected by the leader.

The action echoed the Hungarian leader's remodeling of the nation's judiciary several years back; the Turkish president's court cleanups in 2019; and efforts at comparable actions in Israel and Poland.

Weakening Judicial Independence

Analysts explain that the threats and verbal assaults in the US can be seen as attempts to weaken judicial independence in a system that provides no simple method for the president to dismiss judges Trump disapproves of.

Leonard, an associate professor at the university who has studied democratic decline in free nations, said the White House had learned from the models set by strongmen overseas.

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

Citing examples such as Miller’s relentless claims of nearly limitless presidential authority, she added: “They directly attack the judiciary by stating over and over that it is not a equal branch in the separation of powers.

“They persist in redefine the debate by repeating their claim that the president has greater authority than this judicial branch, which is not how separation powers work.”

The professor said: “Justices' only protection is public trust in the authority of their capacity to make those rulings. Personal intimidation on top of eroding trust in courts may make judges think twice about decisions that go against the current administration, which is, of course, massively problematic for court oversight and for democracy.”

Coercion Methods

Kim Lane Scheppele, professor of social science and global studies at the Ivy League school, has documented the use of “authoritarian law” by the likes of the Hungarian and the Russian, and has spoken out about rising dangers to judges in the US.

She pointed to a wave of so-called “harassment deliveries” this year, in which judges have received unsolicited pizza deliveries with the customer 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 Salas.

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

“Federal judges are protected by the presidential protection and the federal police. And those are both dedicated police units that sit institutionally inside the federal agency. And the former AG has been leading the attacks on federal judges.”

Administration Aims

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