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New details on former GOP candidate accused of shootings · Apple News Today

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  Shumita Basu, Narrating: Good morning! It's Wednesday, January 18th. I'm Shumita Basu. This is "Apple News Today." On today's show, Mexico's former top cop, accused of helping drug cartels, is on trial in Brooklyn, explaining the contradictory numbers in the job market and why eggs are so expensive right now.
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  But first, there are new details in the case of the Republican state legislative candidate in New Mexico accused of targeting Democratic lawmakers. Police say after losing his race, Solomon Peña masterminded a series of shootings, hiring people to fire into homes and allegedly pulling the trigger himself during one of the crimes. No one was injured. In one incident, gunshots went through the bedroom of a 10 year old girl while she slept. Natalie Neysa Alund is covering the story for "USA TODAY."
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  Natalie Neysa Alund: It wasn't just a drive-by with one or two pops. Some of these homes were hit with at least a dozen bullets, and that's a scary thing.
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  Alund told us how the 10 year old, the daughter of State Senator Linda Lopez, woke up during the night of the shooting.
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  Alund: Her 10 year old daughter had woken her up and told her mother that she believed that there was a spider that crawled over her face in bed. So she jumped into bed with her daughter to go to sleep because she was scared. And while in bed, her daughter asked why it felt like there was sand in the bed. But the next morning when Lopez woke up, she noticed that there were holes in her house from gunfire and called police.
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  Police say Peña made baseless claims that the election had been rigged against him. This case comes as violent threats against lawmakers are on the rise nationally. Some reference false claims of stolen elections and right-wing conspiracy theories.
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  Investigators say that Peña paid four men in cash and sent text messages with addresses he wanted them to target.
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  Alund: He did know these four lawmakers. He did visit one of their homes prior to the shooting, according to these criminal complaints. And according to a witness, one of the senators, who told police, "He was at my home, very frustrated and angry several days before the shooting took place."
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  Peña now faces a number of charges, including multiple counts of shooting into an occupied home, attempted aggravated battery with a deadly weapon and conspiracy. "USA TODAY" hasn't reached him or an attorney for comment. Peña is expected in court this afternoon.
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  Mexico's former top law enforcement official is on trial in Brooklyn this week. For over a decade, Genaro García Luna was considered an ally to the U.S. government and the face of Mexico's war on drugs. Prosecutors say he led a double life, helping the very cartels he was supposed to be going after. "VICE" reporter Keegan Hamilton covers organized crime and the drug trade.
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  Keegan Hamilton: Genaro García Luna is accused of taking multimillion-dollar bribes from the Sinaloa Cartel basically to turn a blind eye to their drug trafficking activities and also to feed them intelligence based on what the U.S. and Mexican governments knew and were hearing about.
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  And the cartel could use that information to target their rivals. The powerful Sinaloa Cartel was led by Joaquin Guzmán, also known as El Chapo. It trafficked billions of dollars in illegal drugs. At the time, García Luna worked for the Mexican government, at one point heading up the Mexican equivalent of the FBI. He was seen as tough on drug runners. But American prosecutors say it was all a front.
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  Hamilton: The allegation is that Genaro García Luna was like double dealing, playing both sides, helping El Chapo while telling the U.S. that he was working with them to go after El Chapo.
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  García Luna has pleaded not guilty. The trial is in the same federal courtroom where El Chapo was convicted a few years ago.
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  Hamilton: Genaro García Luna doesn't have nearly the name recognition that Chapo does. He's basically unknown in the U.S., but he's a huge deal in Mexico. I think the people in the U.S. should really care about that because there are hundreds of millions of dollars' worth of security aid that was going to Mexico at this time to fight the cartels. And García Luna was the guy who was tasked with spending that money.
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  Microsoft says it will lay off 10,000 people. That's less than 5% of its global workforce, but still its largest cuts in roughly eight years. It's the latest headline about layoffs, which can be confusing when you look at the overall job market numbers, which are very strong.
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  To understand the economy right now, you might be better off checking a psychology textbook, rather than an econ one. To borrow a psych term, we are in a "cognitive dissonance" economy right now. There's lots of contradicting data that's confusing to professionals, let alone people who are just trying to understand what's going on.
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  We're seeing big companies laying off tens of thousands of people. Amazon and Salesforce made deep cuts recently. But at the same time, the U.S. economy is adding hundreds of thousands of jobs a month. Unemployment is at 3.5%, a 50-year low. So what's the deal here?
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  It's largely that layoffs are happening at tech companies. You hear about them more because they're big, they're popular investments, and many of them make products that we use every day. These companies did well during lockdowns. But now, that boom is over, and there are fears of a recession. Tech stocks have been clobbered lately, and now they're cutting back hard. Some executives admit that they got too optimistic and over-hired in the pandemic run-up.
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  In short, both things can be true. Heavy tech layoffs and overall strength in the labor market. Somehow, this contradictory economy manages to create more than enough jobs to offset those that are disappearing from the tech sector.
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  I'm not sure how I would've gotten through college without the cheap, fueling power of an egg-based meal. But lately, I've found myself standing in the grocery store aisle, for the first time, thinking, "Can I go without them this week?" I don't have to tell you, egg prices are soaring. On average, Americans were paying $1.93 for a dozen last January. By December, we were paying $4.25. "CBS" recently visited a bakery where they're coddling every egg like it's a Faberge.
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  Tida Pichakron: We don't drop an egg, because that's a lot of cost. Every egg counts.
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  One reason we're seeing this happen is demand. For years now, Americans have been eating more eggs, getting more protein from poultry products, while red meat consumption sunk.
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  The other factor here is bird flu. It's so contagious that farmers are quick to slaughter infected birds to prevent the spread. Close to 60 million birds have been infected in the deadliest outbreak in U.S. history.
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  And the third reason here is inflation. When farmers have to pay more for feed, labor, energy and medicine, they need to raise prices or face going out of business.
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  There could be relief ahead. Recent data shows overall inflation cooling a bit, so even if egg prices stay high for a bit longer, maybe you'll save money elsewhere. But if you're dreaming of a big, fluffy omelet for brunch this weekend, sorry to tell you, it's gonna cost you.
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  You can find all these stories and more in the Apple News app. And if you're already listening in the News app right now, we've got a narrated article coming up next. We talked yesterday about the trial over Elon Musk's tweets. Now, "New York" magazine goes inside Twitter and talks to employees there to see how his takeover has been going. That's playing next. I'll be back with the news tomorrow.
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