2016 Postmortem

Trump campaigned with an anti-elite/establishment message, so that's about the only way it could be considered "populist" in my mind. Trump's cabinet picks reveal he was never populist at all, but a manipulator... obvious to most people here!

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Populism

In general, populism is a political style of action that mobilizes a large alienated element of population against a government seen as controlled by an out-of-touch closed elite that acts on behalf of its own interests. The underlying ideology of the Populists can be left, right, or middle. Its goal is to unite the uncorrupt and the unsophisticated (the 'little man') against the corrupt dominant elites (usually the orthodox politicians) and their camp followers (usually the rich and the intellectuals). It is guided by the belief that political and social goals are best achieved by the direct actions of the masses. Although it comes into being where mainstream political institutions fail to deliver, there is no identifiable economic or social set of conditions that give rise to it, and it is not confined to any particular social class.