Yeah, as Cascadiawank said, the Greens split the vote heavily in many traditionally blue states. In NC, GA, and TX, the ruby red suburbs have grown tired of Republicans skirting around the issue of climate change when they can directly feel its effects. So they bit the bullet and voted Dem (they're the reasonable ones compared to the dirty Green commies that want to take your car and your AC).
The original piece was supposed to be about Hawaii, but yeah real life news there recently hasn't been great. Probably not a good sign for OTL.
Decommissioned in 2020 because neither NASA or the Russians had the budget to pay for it. ITTL, NASA's ambitions are even smaller than OTL (just put up a few new satellites here and there so we can monitor the dying planet).