Stop Breathing: The air quality in New York yesterday was so bad it caused the cancellation of three big New York theater productions and two Major League Baseball games as a fog of smoke from Canadian wildfires hangs over as much as a third of the northeastern United States.

  With the sky turned orange by smoke and sunlight, the air quality index in the city hit 400, the worst since 1999. An index of 201-300 is rated hazardous and above 300 is “unhealthy.”

  This morning, Philadelphia is rated “hazardous,” New York and Washington, “unhealthy.”

  It’s all caused by as many as 250 wildfires burning out of control in Canada.

  The smoke  coming down through Wisconsin and Michigan, goes as far southwest as Oklahoma and Texas, and southeast to Georgia and northern Florida. 

Trump World: With a Florida federal grand jury taking testimony about Donald Trump’s possession of classified documents,  the special counsel’s office has notified the Trump legal team that the former president is a target, suggesting that indictment is imminent.

  Trump posted on his Truth Social website, “No one has told me I’m being indicted and I shouldn’t be because I’ve done NOTHING wrong, but I have assumed for years that I am a Target of the WEAPONIZED DOJ & FBI.”

  The existence of the Florida grand jury has gone public only in the past few days, but The Washington Post now reports that any major charges against Trump could be lodged against him in what is now his home state because that’s where Trump illegally held and concealed classified documents. Lesser charges such as perjury or false statements, could still be brought in Washington.

The Racing Form: Former Vice President Mike Pence started his official campaign announcement with a declaration that made it sound like he was going to suck up to Donald Trump even while trying to beat him. Pence said that while he was vice president he was  “proud to stand with Donald Trump every day.”

   But as the speech progressed, Pence laid it on, saying, “Jan. 6 was a tragic day in the life of our nation, but thanks to the courage of law enforcement, the violence was quelled, we reconvened the Congress.” And then, “The very same day, President Trump’s reckless words endangered my family and everyone at the Capitol.”

  He added: “But the American people deserve to know on that fateful day, President Trump also demanded I choose between him and our Constitution. Now voters will be faced with the same choice. I chose the Constitution, and I always will.”

  No other candidate, not even Chris Christie, who blistered Trump, has mentioned the January 6^thinsurrection.

  Little known North Dakota Gov. Doug Burgum also announced yesterday in an intelligent and humorous speech that also hit all the primary bases of hard work, serving the country, blah, blah, blah and also he sold his tech company for a billion dollars. 

Channel Change: CNN boss Chris Licht has been fired after 13 turbulent months in which rating took a dive and he stirred internal turmoil. Admired in some previous incarnations as a wonder-boy of television production, Licht has more recently been described as remote, unpopular with the staff, and he was the guy who made the self-absorbed Don Lemon a morning anchor. 

  The news came shortly after a corporate announcement that Licht’s job was secure, always a bad sign in the news business. Licht was reported to be making phone calls to major on-air figures he’d never met or spoken to previously in an effort to repair his reputation. But one of the last straws was a critical profile published in The Atlantic last week depicting him as being aloof and thin-skinned. 

  David Zaslav, the chief executive of CNN’s parent, Warner Bros. said, “It’s really unfortunate, and ultimately that’s on me. And I take full responsibility for that.”

Wild About Harry: Britain’s Prince Harry became emotional on the witness stand yesterday in his lawsuit against British tabloids he accuses of having hacked his cellphone for stories about his personal life. 

  By going to court with his complaint, Harry has split with the palace’s way of quietly negotiating with the newspapers and feeding them tidbits to satiate them. He testified that he had talked to his lawyers about how to “somehow find a way to put the abuse, intrusion and hate that was coming toward me and my wife to a stop,” through a legal route “rather than relying on the Institution’s way.”

 Harry charges that  about 140 articles published between 1996 and 2010, from his childhood into early adulthood, were based on information illegally obtained.

  Proving his case could be tough. Harry will have to convince the judge that the Mirror Group newspapers intercepted his voice mail messages and those of people close to him. His case is partly circumstantial — he doesn’t seem to have ironclad technological evidence of the hacking.  

Hoop Dreams: The Denver Nuggets beat the Miami Heat again last night, 109-94, taking a 2-1 lead in the NBA finals.

The Obit Page: George Winston, the pianist who competed with pop and rock with a soothing “easy listening” style of instrumentals distributed under the Windham Hill label, has died at age 74.   

  His big album was “Autumn,” released in 1980, featuring songs with one word titles like  “Sea,” “Moon,” and “Woods.”

The Spin Rack: President Biden yesterday vetoed the Republican resolution that would have killed his plan to forgive more than $400 billion in student loans.  — With a dip in advertising, The Los Angeles Times is eliminating 74 newsroom positions, about  13 percent of the total. They say reporters will mostly be spared.

Below the Fold: Seven of nine Supreme Court justices released their financial disclosure reports for 2022. Justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito were granted extensions to polish their stories. 

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