- Trump identified a huge gap between Republican leadership and voters.
- Trump in office is not much different than a Ted Cruz or Bush government. Trump has been more than happy to give away the store to party elites.
If you want to know how the Republican party consolidated, it was not Donald Trump, it was
(49 min) Trump has managed to combine the things that voters and elites felt most strongly about
- Voters: group identities: racial, demographic, nationalistic change: Immigration, Trade, NFL players
- Party Elites: low taxes, overturning Roe, appointing judges, anti-administrative state, anti-Obamacare
He went out his way to say unorthodox things about taxing Hedge Fund managers, protecting Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid. Instinctively lied about those things.
European parties have big state for nativists
The real test of how weak the Republican State would be if he went after the economic elites.
The Democrats are becoming more orthodoxly liberal.