"It's what we called 'The Man,' when you're against The Man," said Nathan Gonzales, editor and publisher of Rothenberg and Gonzales Political Report.

Political strategist Mark McKinnon told NPR he defined "establishment" as a political disease.

In the "New Yorker", Henry Fairlie said he invented "establishment" in the modern sense, but traced the term back to Ralph Waldo Emerson's speech, "The Conservative."

To Phyllis Schlafly in "A Choice, Not An Echo, the establishment was a conspiracy; "a few secret kingmakers in New York [who] selected every GOP presidential nominee from 1936 through 1960." 

NPR's Danielle Kurtzleben: "Powerful, rich, old, out of touch, secretive, moderate — these are how the establishment has been painted..."

“There are some who believe controlling levers of power is the goal in politics, there are some who think advancing an ideas-based agenda is the goal,” said Michael Needham, Heritage Action for America CEO. “The former is the establishment.”