PORTLAND — Sen. Susan Collins said Monday morning that she is concerned by President Donald Trump’s threats of mass layoffs, but she continued to blame the ongoing government shutdown on Senate Democrats.

“Chuck Schumer has proposed that the shutdown just go on,” the Republican said. “That is really a disservice not just to Mainers, but to people throughout this country.”

The federal government closed last Wednesday after Congress failed to reach a temporary budget agreement. Since then, hundreds of thousands of government employees around the country have been furloughed, while others deemed “essential” have continued working without knowing when their next paycheck might arrive.

Congressional Democrats say they won’t sign a deal unless Republicans agree to roll back recent Medicaid cuts and extend expiring health care tax credits. If Congress doesn’t extend those credits, some Mainers who buy health insurance on the marketplace could see their premiums increase by tens of thousands of dollars next year.

Collins, speaking to reporters outside a newly renovated Red Cross facility on Forest Avenue, said she supports extending the credits with a new income cap. But she criticized Democrats for holding the government hostage instead of taking the issue up after passing a clean stopgap funding bill.

“We should not have issues that are very complicated, that split the Senate, attached to the continuing resolution, because all that’s going to do is prolong the shutdown,” she said.

The Republican-led House passed a temporary funding bill last week in a mostly party-line vote. Rep. Jared Golden, D-2nd District, was the only Democrat to vote with Republicans.

Although Republicans control the Senate, too, the continuing resolution needs 60 votes to pass, which means at least seven Democrats would have to vote in favor.

Even as Collins hammered Schumer, the Senate minority leader, she said she disagreed with Trump’s promised layoffs of federal workers who work for “Democratic agencies.” She said she worries that the Office of Management and Budget may use the “nonessential” label as an excuse to fire workers who nonetheless do important jobs.

Collins said she has made it “very clear” to the OMB that she opposes the layoffs. Few Congressional Republicans had spoken out against them as of Monday.

Sen. Angus King joined Collins in speaking at the Red Cross center’s ribbon cutting ceremony but did not stop to answer reporters’ questions. King, an independent who caucuses with Democrats, was one of three Senators who broke ranks last week to vote in favor of a stopgap spending bill after warning that the shutdown would only empower Trump.

Federal workers will start missing paychecks at the end of this week unless Congress comes to an agreement. Collins said that she has developed a “six-point plan” for a deal that has generated support from both Democratic and Republican colleagues.

But ahead of a Monday afternoon floor vote, it remained unclear whether the sides would reach a resolution.

“If my plan is adopted, and if Schumer finally backs off from the pressure he’s under from the far left to disrupt government,” Collins said, “then there’s no reason why government couldn’t open today.”