I remember writing, before the 2016 election, that if the GOP lost I wasn't sure where they'd go next. They'd been a coalition of 1) small-government budget-focused conservatives, 2) religious social conservatives, and 3) publicly disavowed but essential Southern Strategy racially-motivated voters.

A big part of Trump's success came from very clearly not disavowing #3: they finally recognized that they were a plurality of the party and felt empowered to speak up. And the other two groups discovered that they were helpless to exert control once their pet monster decided to run the show.