Gotta love how the least conservative candidate is dominating in the supposedly most conservative region of the country.
It's complicated. Trump is probably the least conservative on economic issues and clearly in the left half of the GOP field on religious conservative issues, but he's clearly the most conservative on civil rights issues and the most hawkish on Islamic terrorism, which the Deep South loves.
It's actually not complicated at all. The candidate you described is the type of candidate that the South loved for the better part of 150 years. Southerners do prioritize social concepts over economic ones, though, which is why so many in recent times have been voting for silly "pro-business" Republicans. The GOP figured out that they just needed to crack the social dogma egg to unlock the South. They never counted on prominent candidates "within their ranks" (does Trump really count as a Republican other than in name only?) ditching the economic agenda, though...let alone ending up being the front-runner.
