Sen. Susan Collins is among a group of Republican senators flying to Mar-a-Lago to meet with President Donald Trump this weekend.

The senators are hoping to talk strategy about passing a government funding bill as a critical deadline approaches. Failure to pass a funding bill by March 14 would lead to a government shutdown, and House and Senate Republicans are at odds over how to proceed.

Collins told reporters in Washington, D.C., on Thursday that the two chambers, where Republicans have thin majorities, have not yet come to an agreement.

“I would not say that we are close,” Collins said, according to Politico.

Collins’ staff confirmed in an email that she was making the trip to Trump’s Florida home Friday.

“Sen. Collins will be attending the Senate Republican retreat in Florida this weekend. It includes dinner tonight at Mar-a-Largo with the president and Republican senators and spouses. While there is not a formal agenda for the dinner, we expect that the budget will be a central  topic of discussion,” her staff said.

Collins’ decision to join the Mar-a-Lago gathering, and the fact she was among those invited, was somewhat of a  surprise given her public breaks with Trump and his insistence on loyalty. But as chair of the Senate Appropriations Committee in a closely divided Congress, she is a key player in budget and spending decisions and a potential swing vote on a range of issues.

Mark Brewer, chair of political science at the University of Maine, said he was a bit surprised that Collins was making the trip, even though she can rightly claim that she needs a good working relationship with the president to advance the interests of her constituents and conduct the nation’s business.

“That being said, it does seem a little odd for her to be doing this given her past comments and at least some actions regarding Trump,” Brewer said. “The reality is that right now, for Collins and every other member of Congress, if you want something you need to work with Trump. The fact that Collins is up for reelection next cycle (in 2026) probably plays a role here as well.”

The Mar-a-Lago meeting comes after a chaotic week in Washington, where Trump’s team in charge of cutting federal spending, led by billionaire businessman Elon Musk, gained access to classified government information, detailed spending records and personal information of federal employees, and moved to cut the federal workforce and shut down the U.S. Agency for International Development.

The moves provoked a strong public backlash, with constituents flooding the phone lines of senators and representatives. Maine’s entire congressional delegation, including Collins, publicly challenged Musk’s authority and said the administration did not have the legal right to block congressionally approved funding.

Despite criticizing the broad access to federal systems granted to Musk, Collins has delivered key votes in support of Trump’s nominees, including Russell Vought as budget director.

Vought is an architect of Project 2025, which contains conservative policy proposals that Trump distanced himself from during his campaign but now appears to be implementing.

Collins, the top Senate appropriator, supported Vought’s confirmation, even though she disagrees with his view that the president has broad authority to freeze and cancel congressionally approved funding for programs he doesn’t like, which critics say is unconstitutional and violates the 1974 Impoundment Control Act.

“If there are impoundments, I believe it will end up in court, and my hope is the court will rule in favor of the 1974 Impoundment and Budget Control Act,” Collins told the Press Herald this week.

In a rare example of Republicans breaking with Trump, Collins was one of three senators from her party to oppose the confirmation of Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth. He was narrowly approved without her support. Collins also was among the senators to express reservations about Matt Gaetz before he dropped out as nominee for attorney general.

Collins’ trip to Trump’s home and resort on Friday is the latest twist in the story of their often-strained relationship.

She hasn’t publicly supported Trump in any of his three runs for president and voted to impeach him for his role in the Jan. 6, 2021, riot at the U.S. Capitol Building. Last fall, she cast a write-in ballot for former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley for president.

Trump, meanwhile, has publicly criticized Collins. After The New York Times reported in 2022 that Collins and Sen. Mitch McConnell were recruiting “anti-Trump candidates,” Trump called Collins “absolutely atrocious” and said he could have ousted her from her Senate seat.

A month later, Trump called Collins “wacky” for leading efforts to make it harder for members of Congress to challenge election results and make it clear that the vice president only has a ceremonial role in counting electoral votes. The changes were made after Trump pressured former Vice President Mike Pence to overturn the 2020 election results.

As was the case during Trump’s first term, Collins remains a key vote on the president’s nominations.

In 2018, she cast a pivotal vote to confirm Brett Kavanaugh to the U.S. Supreme Court after he assured her that abortion protections afforded under Roe v. Wade were settled law. Kavanaugh cemented the conservative majority on the court and, despite his assurances to Collins, helped to end those protections in the court’s 2022 ruling that returned the issue of abortion access to the states.