With fewer than 40 days until the Iowa caucuses, leading Senate Republicans believe the 2024 GOP presidential primary is already over, with former President Donald Trump sitting comfortably atop the polls and his rivals more interested in squabbling with each other.

The party’s presidential debate in Alabama this week yielded the poorest television ratings of the primary cycle so far, and the four candidates who ended up on the stage made little progress in distinguishing themselves from likely runner-up status. They mostly stuck to feuding with each other, name-calling, and even sharing wild conspiracy theories popular on the far right.

“The cake is baked,” Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), one of Trump’s top allies on Capitol Hill, told HuffPost on Thursday about the state of the presidential race.

“I think this is over,“ added first-term Sen. Eric Schmitt (R-Mo.), another Trump backer. “The sooner you get to the [GOP’s 2024] convention the better, but I think he’s got the nomination in hand.”

Even some of Trump’s biggest critics are cleareyed about the reality facing the Republican Party: Trump is poised to once again become their presidential standard-bearer despite being criminally charged over his handling of classified information and his efforts to overturn the 2020 election, culminating in the violent Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection at the U.S. Capitol.