But this is the closest thing to make sense. He doesn’t say meanest, but toughest. There are a lot of desperate people falling out of the modern world, seeing no way out.

Most of us would look to stop the class war, increase jobs and education, strengthen safety nets, etc

They correctly see these things as unwieldy so think a “tough guy” is the only chance. That makes some sense. Somehow he made them believe he was a tough guy rather than just a grifter. Somehow he made them believe he would act in other than personal self-interest. Most importantly he was able to stoke their outrage and identify subgroups to hate, while somehow getting them to ignore reality, history, facts