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Donald Trump’s tariffs of up to 20% will hit the UK when they come into force tomorrow after the US refused to sign a “carve-out” deal that included concessions on agriculture, tax and AI. Discussions will continue after what Trump is calling “Liberation Day”, but ministers believe it could be weeks before an agreement is signed. The Sentencing Council has backtracked on its decision to introduce “two-tier justice” rules, which would have advised courts to order a “pre-sentence report” for offenders from minority groups, says The Daily Telegraph. Justice Secretary Shabana Mahmood says the idea of “differential treatment” for minorities is “corrosive” and will today introduce legislation to block the guidance from ever being introduced. Sam Mendes has announced the all-star cast of his much-hyped quartet of films about The Beatles, due out in April 2028. Paul Mescal will play Paul McCartney; Harris Dickinson is John Lennon; Ringo Star will be portrayed by Barry Keoghan, and Joseph Quinn is playing George Harrison.

Were French judges right to ban Le Pen?

Yesterday’s decision by a Paris court to ban Marine Le Pen from running for office for five years – which likely bars her from the 2027 election, even if she appeals – has gone off like a “detonation” in the French political system, says Charles Sapin in Le Point. The judges were clearly motivated by a desire to damage the far-right leader’s electoral prospects, but they may find the cure worse than the disease. As with the “politicisation of justice” used to attack Italy’s Silvio Berlusconi and Donald Trump in the US, many of National Rally’s 11 million voters will perceive Le Pen’s treatment as the “system” denying the will of the people. This will delegitimise the rule of law and give the wide impression that the electoral game is corrupt – feeding a much more dangerous form of populism than the one before.

This decision will definitely allow Le Pen – or her highly-rated 29-year-old protégé Jordan Bardella – to “play the victim”, says The Guardian. But in a functioning democracy, no politician should be above the law. Le Pen was caught “bang to rights”: showing characteristic contempt for the European Union, as well as taxpayers’ money, she and her cronies siphoned off upwards of €4m to fuel their party’s rise over more than a decade. Their fake jobs scheme – billing the EU for parliamentary assistants who really worked for the domestic party – constitutes “embezzlement on an industrial scale”. Anyone willing to “facilitate systematic corruption” in politics should forfeit the right to seek the country’s highest office. If Le Pen has blown her chance of power, “she has only herself to blame”.

In the first year of the Ukraine war, says Anna Nemtsova in The Atlantic, Georgia was a refuge for Russian refugees, welcoming thousands of political activists and dissidents. But under pressure from Moscow, the Georgian authorities have hardened their approach: border crossers are now interrogated, with some arrested and others deported. This is as good a reflection as any of Georgia’s shift away from the West and towards Russia. Last year, its ruling party abruptly suspended EU accession talks and introduced several Kremlin-style laws clamping down on media criticism and LGBT rights. Russians living in Georgia say their adoptive home has increasingly “come to resemble their native one”.

Gen Z’s latest TikTok obsession is the “mundane daily routine” of a 9-5 office job, says Lara Wildenberg in The Times. There are videos captioned “DIL” (day in the life), “office OOTD” (office outfit of the day) and “GRWMFW” (get ready with me for work). Influencers document their coffee runs and commutes, and post time-lapse videos of them working at their desks. Some companies, such as Deloitte and Unilever, have even hired in-house influencers to woo new staff by promoting their company culture on the app.

Putin’s hand is weaker than it looks

People seem convinced that Vladimir Putin is playing Donald Trump for a fool over Ukraine, says Marc Thiessen in The Washington Post. In reality Trump “holds all the cards”. It’s easy to forget, but the Russian president thought this war would last only a few weeks. His “glacial” advances in 2024 came at a cost of an estimated 427,000 Russian casualties killed or wounded – almost twice as many per month as the US suffered over two decades in Afghanistan – along with 12,000 tanks and armoured vehicles destroyed. The Russians are having to use Soviet-era tanks dating to the 1950s and have even been recommissioning old models used as movie props. To protect these dwindling supplies, the Russians are resorting to so-called “meat assaults” – throwing wave after wave of soldiers at enemy positions, until the Ukrainians run out of ammunition gunning them down and have to retreat.

“Putin’s economic position is even weaker than his battlefield position.” Military spending has unleashed “double-digit inflation, skyrocketing interest rates, and catastrophic labour shortages”. Russian businesses can’t hire anyone decent because working-age people are either fleeing the country or getting slaughtered in Ukraine. All that’s keeping the economy afloat is oil and gas export revenue – and that’s exactly what Trump has threatened to hit, by imposing punitive tariffs on countries which buy Russian oil. There’s clear precedent here – when Trump targeted Iran with similar measures during his first term, Tehran’s oil sales fell from 1.9 million barrels a day to about 400,000, cratering the economy. That’s the reality of these ceasefire talks. If Putin thinks he has the upper hand, he has “gravely miscalculated”.

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It’s an underwater camera set up 55 years ago to catch the Loch Ness Monster, says BBC News, which has been accidentally found by the marine robot Boaty McBoatface. The ocean-going sub was cruising the loch when its propeller snagged the mooring for the forgotten 1970s camera system. The film inside – which was remarkably preserved – did not reveal images of the mysterious beast, though engineers were able develop a few photos of the murky waters. The UK National Oceanography Centre routinely uses Loch Ness to test autonomous underwater vehicles before deploying them in the deep ocean. Who knows what they’re hoping to find.