I always thought that George W. Bush was a unicorn, because he was both the consummate insider and a perpetual outsider. On the one hand, as a presidential princeling, he had access to a web of establishment connections that none of his rivals could match; on the other hand, he consistently went out of his way to emphasize his disdain for that very establishment, most notably through his choice of religion. This mixture of credentials made him the perfect GOP nominee.
Donald Trump, in his own unusual way, has followed a similar path. He grew up wealthy and privileged in New York City. He managed to leverage his vast inherited wealth into celebrity, and then into political power. He and his father were never viewed as being completely respectable by the financial and cultural elite of Manhattan, however, so he developed a chip on his shoulder that he retains today. In Trump’s eyes, and the eyes of his followers, he will always be a scrappy outsider who built a fortune by outwitting his opponents. That this narrative is completely bogus is less important than the fact that it exists.
And so, you can see the blueprint for the GOP nominee (assuming Trump hasn’t made himself dictator for life) in 2024. He will be a swaggering white man who can both communicate easily with Wall Street types and credibly and vividly express the searing anger of the cultural right towards coastal elites. He will be both Mr. Inside and Mr. Outside, but his public face will only be the latter.