People close to Cruz say they have a hard time imagining him endorsing the presumptive GOP nominee, who in March retweeted a post that featured an unflattering picture of Cruz’s wife Heidi next to Trump’s own wife, Melania, a former model.

“If Donald Trump said that kind of stuff about my wife or my father, I would never endorse him,” said Phillips.

David Bozell, president of ForAmerica, which is working with Cruz to head off the possibility of a post-election lame duck session of Congress, said, “it’s a 50-50 call” whether Cruz endorses Trump.

“I don’t think necessarily that right now that he should. God knows how personal it’s gotten between the two of them,” he said. “I tell folks who expect him to, to go pound sand.”