Federal courts decide cases that reach into everyday life in Tacoma and Pierce County: voting rules, federal funding, immigration enforcement, environmental protections, civil rights and the limits of government power. Their decisions will sometimes be wrong, controversial or subject to appeal. But a court cannot do its constitutional work if a judge must weigh a legal conclusion against credible fear for a spouse, child or home.

That is why the sharp rise in threats against judges deserves attention beyond Washington, D.C. It is not a dispute about whether court decisions should be criticized. They should be scrutinized, appealed and debated. It is about the difference between criticizing a ruling and intimidating the person who issued it.

The constitutional role of an independent court

The Constitution places judicial power in the Supreme Court and the lower federal courts created by Congress. Article III gives federal judges tenure during good behavior and protects their compensation while in office. Those provisions are safeguards for independent judgment, not personal privilege. The National Archives’ text of Article III establishes the structure.

The balance is deliberate. Congress writes laws, controls appropriations and confirms judges. The president enforces laws and appoints judges with Senate confirmation. Courts decide cases under the Constitution and laws, including cases that test whether the other branches have acted within their authority. Courts are also accountable through published opinions, appeals, ethical rules and, in the rare cases the Constitution contemplates, impeachment.

That arrangement fails if legal review is recast as a personal affront whenever a ruling goes against an officeholder or political movement. Elected leaders are entitled to challenge legal reasoning and pursue lawful remedies. What they should not do is encourage a climate in which a judge’s family, home address or physical safety becomes part of the argument.

A threat environment that has real victims

The danger is not abstract. On July 19, 2020, a gunman posing as a delivery driver went to the New Jersey home of U.S. District Judge Esther Salas, killed her 20-year-old son, Daniel Anderl, and seriously wounded her husband. The Justice Department has said the attacker found Judge Salas’s address and personal information online. Its account of the attack helped explain the push for stronger privacy protections for judges and their families.

In June 2022, Nicholas Roske traveled from California to the Maryland home of Justice Brett Kavanaugh with a firearm and ammunition and the intent to kill the justice. Roske later pleaded guilty to attempted murder and, in 2025, was sentenced to 97 months in prison followed by lifetime supervised release. The Justice Department’s sentencing announcement describes the plot as an attempt to alter the Court’s composition and rulings through violence.

Recent prosecutions show that threats also reach judges outside the Supreme Court. In February 2025, a Queens man pleaded guilty to threatening to assault and murder a federal district judge in retaliation for an adverse civil ruling. The Eastern District of New York announcement identifies the retaliation motive. In April 2026, a federal jury convicted a Florida inmate of mailing threatening communications to a federal judge after prosecutors presented evidence of a detailed death threat. The Northern District of Florida announcement documents that case.

What the recent numbers show

The federal judiciary’s FY 2027 budget summary reports that U.S. Marshals Service–reported security incidents of significant concern involving judges increased 57 percent in fiscal year 2025 and were on pace to rise again in FY 2026. The judiciary requested further support for its Vulnerability Management Program, which helps judges and qualifying family members reduce the online availability of personal identifying information. The budget summary describes those needs.

The Marshals Service reports a separate set of figures that should not be confused with that 57 percent measure. Its public data lists 731 protective investigations and 513 non-unique threats to federal judges through September 2, 2025, with 364 distinct judges identified as targets. A single investigation can involve more than one person, and one judge can be identified in more than one investigation. The Marshals Service explains its methodology here.

The practical response has grown accordingly. The federal judiciary says that, in 2025, about 80 percent of sitting judges, more than 100 retired judges and 1,200 qualifying family members were enrolled in a program that identifies and helps remove personal information from data brokers, social media, public-record websites and other online sources. Its annual security report also describes courthouse-hardening projects.

Criticism is protected; intimidation is not

Strong criticism of the judiciary is not only lawful; it can be valuable. Courts exercise consequential power, and their reasoning should be tested in public. Litigants may appeal. Congress can legislate within constitutional limits. Journalists and citizens can examine the record and argue for legal reform.

The boundary is crossed when speech becomes a true threat, when private information is weaponized, or when violence and harassment are used to pressure a judge over a case. The Chief Justice’s 2024 year-end report noted both the importance of candid criticism and the danger posed by violence, intimidation and defiance directed at judges. It reported that hostile threats and communications to judges had more than tripled over the preceding decade. Read the report.

No single remark proves that it caused a particular crime; responsibility for a threat or act of violence belongs to the person who makes it. But public officials and major commentators have unusual reach. When they portray a judge as an enemy or illegitimate merely for deciding an unwelcome case, they help erode the norm that disagreements belong in courts and the democratic process—not at a judge’s doorstep.

Why Tacoma readers should care

The same independent judiciary that decides high-profile national disputes is the forum in which individuals, cities, businesses and public agencies seek enforcement of federal rights and limits. A resident challenging government action needs a judge who can decide the case on law and evidence. A government official, too, needs a court whose judgments carry legitimacy because they were reached without coercion.

Protecting judges does not mean insulating courts from accountability or treating every decision as beyond challenge. It means preserving the conditions under which accountability can work: reasoned opinions, lawful appeals, transparent ethical standards and physical safety for the people charged with deciding cases. For related context, see Network of Tacoma’s guide to the rule of law and its analysis of courts and election integrity.

The constitutional balance of power depends on each branch respecting the legitimate role of the others. Diminishing the judiciary through intimidation diminishes more than judges. It weakens a public institution that people rely on when power needs a lawful check.