Why Donald Trump Could Win the Republican Nomination

In ways large and small, with policy and with personality, billionaire Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump is forcing his party's establishment to confront the vast divide between party leaders and the voters who, according to nearly every poll for months, have wanted him to carry their torch to the White House.

A prevailing narrative is that Trump is leading in the polls by appealing to the far right. That's an oversimplification. Trump is offering Republicans something no other candidate can: An insider's knowledge of the elite combined with a mischievous determination to upend it and an unorthodox set of policy prescriptions—running the gamut from immigration to campaign finance to Social Security—that aim to achieve that goal. In this year's contest for the Republican nomination, that platform has proven to have staying power.