Leveraging Populism: Analyzing the Republican Party’s Success During the 2016-2021 Trump Era

The Trump era between 2016 and 2021 was a period of success for the Republican Party, as determined by the party’s control of the executive, the legislature, and the judiciary. The party’s success can be attributed to Trump’s populist platform, in combination with additional causal factors, listed as follows. It is concluded that, first, internal party democracy enabled the election of a populist such as Trump as the party nominee. Trump built legitimacy among voters as a populist by self-financing his campaign. Moreover, Trump’s populism exploited existing cleavages in American society and reinforced partisan-associated identities. He was able to mobilize voters deep within the Republican base, namely, white, Evangelical, working-class people without higher education. Ultimately, through a high degree of base mobilization, he transformed the Republican Party to resemble a mass party, which was better equipped to compete within a polarized party system than its opponents.