And just who else are we to expect a Sunni Head of State to support?
Salafists do not get along with mainstream Sunnis. In fact they’ve fought wars against them.
Salafists consider other Sunnis [and Shiites and Sufis] to be insufficiently Muslim. But even among Salafists there are three main factions [and a lot of little splinter groups.].
The first faction does not believe in getting tangled up with politics or overthrowing insufficiently muslim rulers but focuses on spiritual affairs, worship and preaching. They generally leave well enough alone so long as they can do their thing. This faction is much diminished and overshadowed by the others, especially since the rise of pan-Arabism/anticolonialism in the Cold war.
The second faction is not so passive. They are activists/community organizers who believe in revolution against insufficiently muslim or nonmuslim rulers to reach their ultimate caliphate, but in a Gramsciian way- infiltration of institutions, litigation, political haggling, etc, rather than through overt violence. I say Gramsciian as in the Italian Gramsci who spoke of a long march through the institutions, like the communists masquerading as Democrats have done in the US- shedding outsider Communist Party identity to run as “progressive democrats,” working not to overthrow the constitution openly but to corrupt it and reinvent it, imposing socialism gradually. It’s the Salafist “third way” between quiet piety and jihad.
The final faction are the jihadists, who will use violence as necessary -and often even if not necessary- against nonmuslims and insufficiently muslim people, with the aim of a establishing an Islamic caliphate.
The latter two factions feed off of each other and complement one another.
Of course even that once passive first faction has spawned some groups that while not directly engaging in politics or violence themselves, are, in the process of converting people spiritually, creating a steady supply of like minded converts but also converts who eventually find the passive approach frustrating. These then look for something more interesting and are recruited by the activist faction of Salafis.... and if these are still too soft or too slow for an inspired and impatient convert’s tastes, then they join up with the jihadists.