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

The US President does not usually take advice, especially from international figures who frequently seek to flatter and admire the American leader.

However, El Salvador's authoritarian leader Bukele has adopted a different strategy by calling on the White House to emulate his actions in impeaching what he terms “dishonest judges.”

His appeal for Trump to move against the American court system also received backing from Maga figures, such as an social media message by former supporter Elon Musk, who has previously boosted the Salvadoran's demands to oust US judges.

Unprecedented Risks to Judicial Independence

Experts note that Bukele's recent remarks come at a time of unprecedented dangers to judicial independence and individual judges in the United States, and during a period where the president's team is using similar authoritarian tactics used by leaders in nations such as Turkey, Hungary, the Asian nation, and Bukele's own the Central American country to weaken democratic accountability.

Bukele's online call recently was just the latest in a string of taunts and allegations he has leveled against the US's legal system, such as a March assertion that the US was “facing a court takeover,” and his mockery of a federal judge's ruling to halt deportation flights transporting accused undocumented individuals 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 presidential advisor Miller, attorney general Bondi, Elon Musk, and Trump personally in a latest media briefing.

Immergut had ordered injunctions preventing the administration from mobilizing the military reserves, initially in Oregon then in California. The president has been eager to send soldiers into Portland, which the leader has characterized as “battle-scarred” based on limited, non-violent protests outside the urban homeland security facility.

History of Targeting Judges

The advisor, Bondi, and Musk have a long record of attacking judges who have ruled against Trump's executive orders or in other ways impeded the government's political agenda. Prior to returning to power this year, the president directed his followers against judges overseeing his civil and criminal trials, who were then inundated with threats and abuse.

Watchdog organizations, police departments, and judges themselves have highlighted a increased climate of risks and intimidation in the months since he returned to the White House.

Increasing Risk Data

According to data gathered by the US Marshals Service, in the current year through the third quarter, there were 562 threats to nearly four hundred federal judges, leading to more than eight hundred investigations. This year has already surpassed 2022, and last year, and is on track to exceed 2023's high of 630 reported incidents.

The threats are not only happening at the national level. Data from the university's Bridging Divides Initiative indicates that there have been at least fifty-nine cases of threats, harassment, stalking, or violence committed against judges on the local level in the current year.

Expert Analysis on Threat Sources

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

In May, the Global Project Against Hate and Extremism (GPAHE) published a comprehensive report claiming that “harmful and reckless statements from White House allies and supporters coincide with escalating aggressive posts on social media.” It recorded “a fifty-four percent rise in calls for removal and physical intimidation against judges across social media platforms from January to February of this year, the first full month of the president's term.”

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

International Authoritarian Playbook

That march towards authoritarianism has been common in recent years in several nations, such as by the Salvadoran.

In several years ago, immediately after commencing a new term in the face of constitutional prohibitions, Bukele’s parliamentary loyalists voted to dismiss the nation's top prosecutor and several justices on the supreme court. The judges, who had provoked his ire by ruling against coronavirus measures, were replaced by new appointees selected by the leader.

The action echoed the Hungarian leader's overhaul of Hungary’s court system several years back; the Turkish president's court cleanups in 2019; and attempts at similar moves in Israel and Poland.

Weakening Judicial Independence

Experts say that the threats and verbal assaults in the US can be seen as attempts to undermine court autonomy in a structure that offers no easy way for the president to remove judges Trump opposes.

Meghan Leonard, an academic at Illinois State University who has researched democratic decline in free nations, said the Trump administration had learned from the examples 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 legislation that would undermine the judiciary,” she said.

Pointing to instances such as Miller’s persistent claims of broad presidential authority, she noted: “They openly criticize the courts by stating repeatedly that it is not a co-equal branch in the government structure.

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

The professor said: “Judges' only protection is public trust in the legitimacy of their ability to make those decisions. Individual threats on top of eroding institutional legitimacy may make judges hesitate about judgments 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 Princeton University, has documented the use of “authoritarian law” by the such as the Hungarian and the Russian, and has warned about escalating dangers to judges in the US.

She highlighted a wave of termed “pizza doxxings” recently, in which judges have received unwanted pizza deliveries with the recipient listed as Daniel Anderl, the child of Judge Esther Salas, who was killed at the residence in several years ago by a gunman targeting Salas.

“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 Marshals Service. And those are both specialized law enforcement that are placed structurally inside the Department of Justice. And the former AG has been spearheading the criticism on justices.”

Government Goals

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