TODAY’S WEATHER

🌧️ We’re waking up to rain in many parts: in Glasgow I’ll last most of the day while Edinburgh and Aberdeen should dry off by lunchtime, with sunny intervals to follow. London will be dry but overcast early on, brightening later too. (Here’s the UK forecast).

THE BIG STORIES
Court blocks all of Trump’s “Liberation Day” tariffs | By-election race hots up as Reform’s challenge grows

📣 A US trade court has blocked US President Donald Trump’s “Liberation Day” tariffs, saying they are illegal and that the president “exceeded any authority” in imposing them. The White House says it will appeal, but the ruling is being seen as a huge blow to a key part of his economic policies. (BBC) (🎁 Bloomberg - free to read)

• The timing of the ruling is “accidentally superb”, writes Alan Beattie. It comes as the US and EU are locked in trade talks: the EU should “regroup, screw up its courage and recognise that Trump is far more vulnerable than his bluster suggests.” (FT £)

Also from the US this morning:

• A “disillusioned” Elon Musk is leaving his US government role after a noisy but - by the targets he set himself - largely ineffective period spearheading attempts to reduce the scale of the federal bureaucracy. (🎁 New York Times - free to read)

• The US will “aggressively” revoke visas of Chinese students, says Secretary of State Marco Rubio. (🎁 New York Times - free to read)

• The Wall Street Journal calls the Trump Administration’s assault on Harvard University, in which it has withdrawn billions in funding and tax exemptions, an attempt to destroy the institution “for the offence of fighting back”. It is, says the title, “a short-sighted attack on one of America’s great competitive strengths: its ability to attract the world’s best and brightest”. (🎁 Wall Street Journal - free to read)

📣 The by-election race in Hamilton, Larkhall and Stonehouse is hotting up, with the outcome increasingly seen as a bellwether for broader political shifts in Scotland and across the UK.

Reform UK’s rise in the constituency is the big talking point, with Nigel Farage’s party taking centre stage because of its attack ads on Anas Sarwar, and the other parties’ attempts to position themselves against it.

• The Daily Record devotes its print front page to an “open letter” from John Swinney this morning: “Dear voters,” it reads. “Labour can’t win this by-election so if you want to beat Reform the only way to stop them is to vote SNP.” (See the front page) (Read the text)

• Labour “party sources” also tell the Record there’s dismay over their candidate. “It was supposed to be a two-horse race between Labour and the SNP, but we selected a donkey and look like coming third.” Their candidate, Davy Russell, has shied away from TV appearances and public debates. (Daily Record)

• But the leading pro-UK campaign organisation, Scotland in Union, is urging supporters to back Labour in the by-election, saying Nigel Farage “can’t be trusted” to oppose the SNP. (Herald)

IDEAS
Running the rule on Reform’s rise

🗣️ Could Reform win the byelection in Hamilton, Larkhall and Stonehouse? Away from the sound and the fury of the row over Reform UK’s dog whistle attack ads on Anas Sarwar, there’s a growing sense among those covering and commentating on the race that they could. And it would fit into a broader narrative that Nigel Farage’s party is on the march.

🗣️This week’s Holyrood Sources podcast is a good place to start, with its uncanny ability to voice, in public, the sort of chat which Scotland’s political enthusiasts usually only have in private. Journalist Catriona Stewart is a guest on the show and talks of visiting the constituency. She found people happy, now, to talk about voting Reform - fewer “shy Reform voters” these days.

Moreover, they’re being drawn from a range of backgrounds, including better-off voters who are put off the SNP and Labour by high taxation.

Reform are deploying tactics that work well for them in England, she says, and that’s not holding them back - they’ve gone from hoping to land third place in the byelection to being in a two-horse race to win it.

There are also some sharp points on Labour’s candidate, who appears to be entirely unwilling to speak or debate in public. What were they thinking? (Holyrood Sources)

🗣️Where is this Reform vote coming from? We’ve already mentioned taxation. But there are other factors, too, and that’s what Alex Massie explores in the Times today. By way of illustration, he zeroes in on the news that the cast of a play about the 2008 financial crisis, being staged by the National Theatre of Scotland, is being asked to attend “anti-oppression training”.

“When nonsense stalks the land like this and respectable people pretend there is nothing to see do not be surprised if the political party prepared to say ‘This is nonsense’ begins to do well. People can spot what is happening. We may have passed ‘peak woke’ but its legacy hangs around nonetheless. This is part of the culture from which Nigel Farage and Reform emerge,” he says. (The Times £)

🗣️How should the other parties fight Reform? By offering a more positive vision to the vast majority of Scots who wouldn’t back Farage’s party, says Adam Morris, the Scottish Conservatives’ former head of communications. He takes his inspiration from the weekend’s Edinburgh Marathon Festival crowds. “Not one person here today,” he thought as he ran round the course, “would vote for [Reform UK].

“And that being the case, how do Scottish political parties gather these many positive, productive and upbeat people – happy to sacrifice a Saturday morning for a joyous, worthwhile activity – and unite them in the way the Edinburgh Marathon Festival had?”

They want, says Morris, to hear positive stories about the potential of their country and its people, “telling good stories about climate change and immigration, and setting out hard-and-fast aspirations for standards in schools and quality of healthcare.

“They pine for thought, intellect and optimism in their leaders.” (The Scotsman)

AROUND SCOTLAND

📣 John Swinney is being urged to protect Scotland’s NHS from immigration plans from Westminster, which opponents claim will add huge pressures to health and social care services here. (The Scotsman has the exclusive)

📣 Controversial Irish rap band Kneecap will not play this summer’s TRNSMT festival because of concerns over the “potential reaction” they’ll spark. (Daily Mail)

📣 Police are examining 1,000 hours of CCTV as concerns mount for a 19-year-old who went missing three weeks ago in Falkirk. (STV)

AROUND THE UK

📣 The wife of the man who drove his car into Liverpool fans on Monday evening only found out about the horror “when she saw her car on the TV news”. (Daily Mail)

• The suspect is a “married businessman and father-of-three” (Independent)

📣 The BBC goes in-depth on Kemi Badenoch’s leadership of the Conservatives, and speaks to insiders who say her “missteps are a ‘total disaster’” for the party. (BBC)

📣 Andrew Tate and his brother Tristan have been charged with rape and human trafficking in the UK. But the online influencers will have to face ongoing criminal proceedings in Romania, where they live, before extradition to the UK. (Independent)

AROUND THE WORLD

🌎 A former surgeon was handed a 20-year jail term after admitting 299 cases of rape or assault, mostly committed on children under 15. Joël Le Scouarnec has been branded France’s worst paedophile - he was already in prison for offences against four children. (Le Monde)

🌎 Hundreds of people climbed Mount Everest this month, despite harsh weather forcing many to retreat. AP has some extraordinary pictures of the rush to the summit, with one depicting a long queue of climbers strung out along a precipitous ridge. (AP)

🌎 Meet the Syrian entrepreneur gunning to be Ukraine’s drone king. (Semafor)

SPORT

⚽️ Italian coach Davide Ancelotti has had fresh talks with Rangers about taking over at Ibrox and looks to be edging closer to taking the job, according to Guillem Balague. He wants the job, and is favourite. But Balague’s piece set hares running when he appeared to suggest Luka Modric fancied coming with him. Balague has since clarified on social media - but not in his piece - that Modric isn’t coming to Rangers… just that he’s aware of Ancelotti’s interest in the role. (BBC)

⚽️ Chelsea produced a storming second-half performance to win the Europa Conference League last night, beating Real Betis 4-1. The Spaniards had made things interesting early on, looking the better side as they took the lead. But then, as Jacob Steinberg puts it, “Cold [sic] Palmer finally emerged, decided that enough was enough and took an icy hold on a final that was in danger of running away from Chelsea”. (Guardian)