There was a time—long, long ago—when the Republican Party was afraid of Donald Trump, but it truly loathed Ted Cruz.

They hated him. They couldn’t stand him. They might have thought Trump was a huckster, they might have thought he didn’t have any idea what he was doing, and they might have thought he was a bigot, but at least he wasn’t as insufferable as Ted Cruz, the man who had gone out of his way to wreck the party’s plans in Congress, and had called Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell a liar. Forced to choose, party elders tended to shudder and lean Trump. Lindsey Graham was particularly piquant in his criticism. He was very clear he didn’t like Cruz, who he said was no better than Trump and whom he accused of McCarthyism. He cracked, “If you killed Ted Cruz on the floor of the Senate, and the trial was in the Senate, nobody would convict you.”

A lot can change in a couple weeks. Graham made his joke about murdering Cruz way back on February 26, which makes it all the more surprising to hear from the South Carolina senator these days.

“I can work with Ted Cruz,” Graham said. “I know what I’m getting with Ted Cruz.”

That’s not exactly a ringing endorsement, but it’s something. Graham may be the most prominent Republican coming around on Cruz, but he’s not the only one. One implication of the “#NeverTrump” movement is that anyone is more acceptable—especially Cruz, who is at least a Republican. On Tuesday night, on the eve of his state’s primary, Mississippi Governor Phil Bryant announced his endorsement of Cruz. It’s telling that at this late stage in the campaign Cruz still hasn’t received the blessing of a single sitting member of the body in which he serves. The shift, however tentative and awkward and pained, by Republican officeholders toward Cruz is something to behold, nearly as surprising as Trump’s own collection of a few establishment backers.