It’s all they have. They’ve got anger and hate, and nothing else.

As it was established by Nixon's Southern Strategy it's totally about preserving power (which they use for the highest bidders). Anger and hate keeps their base voting for them.

But their base is fickle, which is now Donald Trump seized the 2016 Republican Primary from everyone else. And while Trump is facing all his indictments and other player like DeSantis vie to take his place, that base will eventually find another Secret Hitler to fall behind.

Misery mostly. Industrialized hate for profit.

Cult leaders have weaponized this pain for their own power and profit.They lie to people, tell them it's not their fault, to blame their failures on [insert latest convenient target]. They will fix everything if only they received more [power/money]. They distract from the unacceptable truth that it is their own actions that have led to their misery (including decades voting for same party and policies that "somehow" never helped). The cult is the most important thing in their life now, after cutting out disagreeable family and friends. These poor bastards will be squeezed for all they're worth.

I'm not sure how miserable, lonely, damaged, mentally ill a person needs to be to be susceptible to this. But apparently we have more than enough to terrorize.