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Like Many Populist Leaders, Trump Accuses Judges of Being Illegitimate Obstacles to Safety and Democracy  (Michael Gregory, The Conversation)
Federal judges and at times Supreme Court justices have repeatedly challenged – and blocked – President Donald Trump’s attempts to reshape fundamental aspects of American government.
Many of Trump’s more than 150 executive orders, including one aimed at eliminating the Department of Education, have been blocked by injunctions and lawsuits.
When a majority of Supreme Court justices ruled on May 16, 2025, that the Trump administration could not deport a group of Venezuelan immigrants without first giving them the right to due process in court, Trump attacked the court.
“The Supreme Court of the United States is not allowing me to do what I was elected to do,” Trump wrote on Truth Social. “This is a bad and dangerous day for America!” he continued in the post.
As the Trump administration faces other orders blocking its plans, the president and his team are framing judges not just as political opponents but as enemies of democracy.
Trump, for example, has called for the impeachment of James Boasberg, a federal judge who also issued orders blocking the deportation of immigrants in the U.S. to El Salvador. Attorney General Pam Bondi has said that Boasberg was “trying to protect terrorists who invaded our country over American citizens,” and Trump has also called Boasberg and other judges who ruled against him or his administration “left-wing activists.”
“We cannot allow a handful of communist, radical-left judges to obstruct the enforcement of our laws and assume the duties that belong solely to the president of the United States,” Trump said at a rally in April 2025. “Judges are trying to take away the power given to the president to keep our country safe.”
As a scholar of legal and political theory, I believe this kind of talk about judges and the judicial system is not just misleading, it’s dangerous. It mirrors a pattern seen across many populist movements worldwide, where leaders cast independent courts and judges as illegitimate obstacles to what they see as the will of the people.
By confusing the idea that the people’s will must prevail with what the law actually says, these leaders justify intimidating judges and their sound legal rulings, a move that ultimately undermines democracy.