Donald Trump’s unlikely presidential campaign promises to endure into the autumn as he builds a coalition of followers that stretches from the centre of the Republican party to its Tea Party fringe and beyond.
The billionaire tycoon is due to campaign in South Carolina today, a crucial early primary state that demonstrates the mass appeal of his attacks on political correctness and his anti-immigrant rhetoric.
Mr Trump, who has been married three times and who has said that he has never found a reason to ask God for forgiveness, is the leading candidate among South Carolina’s Evangelical Christians. A third of them back him, according to a poll by Monmouth University. His stump speech applause lines — “the American dream is dead”; “our leaders are stupid” — are reverberating across the Republican spectrum.
In South Carolina he also leads among fiscally conservative Tea Party supporters, with 33 per cent backing him. He wins by wide margins among Republicans who describe themselves as “very conservative”, “somewhat conservative” and “moderate to liberal”.
A similar picture has emerged nationally: Mr Trump has more than twice as much support as his nearest Republican rival, Jeb Bush. Several polls have shown Mr Trump leading among female voters, despite having called women “disgusting animals”.
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At a recent Trump rally in New Hampshire, many in the crowd were well educated and informed. They liked his “gumption” and considered him incorruptible. Earlier surveys had suggested that his following mostly came from young, poorly educated white men.
Mr Trump’s calls for mass deportations of immigrants and the ending of birthright citizenship have been applauded by white supremacist and neo-Nazi groups. David Duke, the antisemitic former Ku Klux Klan leader, called his candidacy “a great thing”.
On Tuesday night Jorge Ramos of Univision, the most influential Hispanic news presenter in the US, was briefly ejected from a press conference held by Mr Trump. Ramos had annoyed the billionaire by standing up to ask a question without being called. The presenter had previously called Mr Trump “the loudest voice of intolerance, hatred and division in the United States”.
The unusual composition of the Trump coalition takes American politics into uncharted territory, although Republicans have had summer flings with candidates before. In 2011 Herman Cain, a former pizza chain boss, led the polls for a spell, but he did not have the name recognition of Mr Trump, who has promoted his personal brand with gusto for three decades.
Most Republicans do not support him and say they never will. Pollsters expect him to maintain his lead until the Republican field, which boasts 17 candidates, is winnowed out.
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However, changes in campaign finance laws that allow mega donations mean that one donor can keep a candidate afloat. That could delay the thinning of the Republican field and prolong the Trump campaign.