Trump has certainly contributed to the amount of distrust the latter are now feeling, of course. Though I’m personally struggling to say whether this was due to his positioning alone, or (at least in part) thanks to an increasingly larger portions of the “machine” actively weaponizing more and more of its metaphorical antibodies against the threat of his highly unwarranted “invasion”.
I think one thing you’re missing is the huge right-wing media ecosystem, the part of the “machine” that supports Trump, even spreading lies to support him. Take for example the court case Dominion v. Fox which showed pretty clearly that Fox News is willing to broadcast statements they know are false, as long as it’s what their audience wants to hear (i.e. they’re audience captured). Fox News is one of the largest media networks in the US and when Trump and his attorneys said the election was stolen, and Fox News knew it wasn’t stolen, they still said it was stolen.
I think one thing you’re missing is the huge right-wing media ecosystem, the part of the “machine” that supports Trump, even spreading lies to support him. Take for example the court case Dominion v. Fox which showed pretty clearly that Fox News is willing to broadcast statements they know are false, as long as it’s what their audience wants to hear (i.e. they’re audience captured). Fox News is one of the largest media networks in the US and when Trump and his attorneys said the election was stolen, and Fox News knew it wasn’t stolen, they still said it was stolen.