Week in Review: Murder investigation, Washington legislature, and tech layoffs

Bill Radke discusses the week’s news with freelance journalist Joanne Silberner, Puget Sound Business Journal’s Alex Halverson, and Seattle Times Elise Takahama.

Bryan Kohlberger was charged with murder by Idaho authorities this week in the November stabbing deaths of four University of Idaho students. Kohlberger is a 28-year old Washington State University criminology PhD student. He was arrested on December 30th in Pennsylvania. What do we know about this case so far?

On Tuesday, Washington Senator Patty Murray temporarily became second in line for the presidency when she was sworn in in as Senate president pro tem. That role is usually third in line behind the Vice President and Speaker of the House, but at the time she was sworn in no Speaker had been voted in. Murray became the first woman in the history of the country to hold that role. What is her response to the chaos in the House?

King County has been selected as one of 15 counties to take part in the Center for Disease Control National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES). The results of the survey help public health officials direct health policy and design public health programs. King County survey participants will be chosen at random. How impactful are the results of this survey?

On Thursday, the Washington State Nurses Association announced that they would reintroduce legislation that would implement strict nurse-to-patient ratios. The state hospital association opposes this, saying that there are not enough nurses to make this happen, and patients might be turned away. Why are health care labor unions saying this is so important?

On Tuesday, both Salesforce and Amazon announced more layoffs. Salesforce will lay off 10 percent of its 70,000 person workforce, while Amazon will lay off 18,000 workers, up from the 10,000 layoffs projected in November. What sort of impact will we see locally?