No, wrong. It won't go down. Completely separate groups. Never have been in cahoots before. SLS funding is not related to space and planetary science or climate research and JPL don't want SLS. Goodard and JPL can fly on other vehicles.Not impossible—but such a night of long knives may cost them votes they need on other things down the road.
Goddard and Marshall could not be more different, but I can imagine the following conversation happening between two senators:
“Now if you don’t want your big orange killed, keep the orange in chief from axing our climate change sat. You have my back—and I’ll have yours…in return, I ‘ll have the folks in Pasadena understand that their probes go on your rockets alone.”
You KNOW something like that is going to go down…some kind of deal. Trust me, it won’t just be MSFC suffering arterial spray…a wounded beast is the most dangerous.
Kill SLS? Fine…and if Goddard wants more climate change this or that—they’ll bleed too.
Also, more NASA probes means more Falcon, Vulcan and NG, which covers CA, TX, CO, AL, WA, FL, vs just AL, UT and LA. Commerical space now has a broader base and more work than NASA contracts