I stumbled across this guy who seems to have a pretty good handle on what is going on with Trump and his followers. Rather than try to explain it, I'll let him explain it in his own words.

Here's the first video in his series. I'll let you do the work of finding the rest
YouTube: Stumping Trumpists 1/9: Know Thy Enemy. (TRYING BEINGS: From Life's Origins to Total Jerks)

He gets a bit frustratingly slow in the development of some of his points. While I recommend sticking with him through all of the videos in the series, you'll get the main points by watching this first one and then part 6. Part 1 talks about what is going on in the cult, and part 6 gives some ideas on how to talk to a Trumpist.

If you dig through his channel, you can find a couple of "older" (about 2 - 3 months old) videos on Trump and his followers.

The key takeaways are that this behavior is nothing new. It's been used time and time again, from the Crusades (and even earlier) through Hitler and Mussolini. It's the same pattern over and over, just with a different label on the cover. It is as simple as people protecting themselves from facing the truth about their condition as humans by setting themselves up as a hero and putting down anyone who doesn't agree with them.

I'm not sure what this information tells us about where things are going, but it certainly helps my own mental health by understanding what the heck is going on around me. This understanding will keep me from expending too much mental energy in places where it will do absolutely no good, and instead spend that energy in more productive ways.

--Peter

Pro tip - Set YouTube to play at 125% speed to keep things moving along. Most people can understand much faster than other can talk clearly. I've tried 150%, but find it going a bit too fast. Then again, I'm old and decrepit. Barely fit enough to drool on the keyboard.