Earlier this year, Mitt Romney warned that Donald Trump is “a phony, a fraud” whose foreign policy views are “uninformed and … dangerous.” Later, when Trump won the GOP nomination, Romney said he could not support him.

But that was then. Now Trump is the president-elect — and Romney will meet with him Saturday in Bedminster, N.J., to offer counsel and possibly discuss a potential cabinet role, Trump’s transition team announced Friday.

Romney is not alone in his outreach. In the early days of Trump’s transition to the White House, a stream of former Republican adversaries and skeptics has trickled through the lobby at Trump Tower in midtown Manhattan, en route to meet privately with the president-elect.

One former critic, South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley, said earlier this year that Trump’s rhetoric was “irresponsible.” This week, however, Haley gushed that Trump’s victory has left her “giddy.” Haley met with Trump on Thursday, stirring speculation that she, too, might serve in his cabinet.

The sudden about-face by some of Trump’s former GOP foes is enough to induce whiplash. Just a few weeks ago, many of the same lawmakers, strategists and party leaders were beginning to strategize how they would rebuild the party after Trump’s inevitable defeat.

Many of them opposed Trump on principle in the face of steep political risk, fearing his long-term effects on the Republican Party. But Trump instead has helped the party reach new heights of political power, securing a unified GOP government — and with it a semi-permanent place for his brand of Republicanism, complicating intraparty resistance efforts moving forward.

Evan McMullin, a former House Republican staffer whose third-party challenge to Trump put Utah in play, said he would “give [Trump] a chance to govern,” but that “doesn’t mean we ought to check our principles at the door.”

“If he governs the way he said he would govern,” McMullin said, “then the place for true constitutional conservatives in the party is seriously in jeopardy.”

Still, the GOP civil war many Republicans anticipated might now consist instead of scattered acts of civil disobedience: public objections to Trump’s policy pushes on trade or infrastructure spending, perhaps, or attempts to create distance from his harsh rhetoric.

“You’re going to have a lot of people like me who are going to be consistent with what we believe and be true to that,” said Rep. Adam Kinzinger, an Illinois Republican who did not back Trump and has taken issue with his stances toward NATO and Russia in particular.

These early days of transition to the new presidency, however, have taken on a halcyon quality for many skeptical Republicans. Trump’s “grab them by the p---y” period now seems distant, while the prospect of signing conservative policy into law is more tangible than ever.

"There are deals to be made in this body. Big, huge deals that will make America great,” said Sen. Lindsey Graham, who was such a nuisance to Trump that he famously revealed Graham’s cell phone number during a press conference.

Nor do Republicans who opposed Trump appear concerned, at least not publicly, that they will be in effect exiled during a Trump presidency.

Sen. Jeff Flake, an Arizona Republican, expressed optimism that the party could “move ahead” without residual bitterness. “Elections are elections, campaigns are campaigns,” he said. “... If you’re in the Senate or if you’re in the White House, it’s tough to hold grudges.”

Some of Trump’s GOP skeptics have been heartened by some of his preliminary personnel decisions: naming Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus as his chief of staff and Rep. Mike Pompeo, a Kansas Republican, as CIA director. Although Trump’s pick of former Breitbart chairman Steve Bannon as chief strategist in the White House was met with awkward silence by GOP lawmakers, senators lauded his nomination of Sen. Jeff Sessions to serve as attorney general.

But Trump is so far stacking his administration with loyalists, raising the question of whether he could extend an olive branch and turn to former GOP adversaries for any top posts. Trump met this week with Sen. Ted Cruz, who made a scene at the Republican convention with a speech that did not endorse Trump and urged Republicans to “vote your conscience.” Cruz later endorsed Trump, but it is still not clear whether there will be a spot for the Texas senator in the administration or, perhaps the Supreme Court.

Eliot Cohen, a former Bush administration official, this week warned Republicans against signing on to Trump’s transition or administration, saying the team was, in his experience, acting “angry” and “arrogant,” “screaming, ‘You lost!’” But other anti-Trump Republicans have reported more positive treatment by Trump’s allies.

“They seem pretty gracious and in no way vindictive,” said Rep. Charlie Dent, a Pennsylvania Republican.

If Trump’s campaign repelled Republicans like Dent, his presidency is bringing them home, appealing to their patriotism or pragmatism to make the best of it.

“‘Never Trump’ was about not voting for him, not about wishing for a Trump presidency to be unsuccessful,” said Rory Cooper, a Republican strategist who opposed Trump throughout the election and aided “Never Trump” efforts. “But that success has to be the country's success.”

James Arkin and Caitlin Huey-Burns contributed to this story.