Update 3/19/2024

ACT NOW TO PROTECT VAPING IN ARIZONA

In fast developing situation,  a new anti-vaping bill (SB 1365) is being submitted to the Arizona House Ways and Means Committee tomorrow, after the initial vape ban bill (SB 1212) failed to move beyond the committee.

The vapor product directory bill in the House Ways and Means Committee will be discussed on:

• Wednesday, March 20, 2024
• 10:00 AM
• Room HHR 1

If you vape and care about adult access to alternative products, it is imperative that you make your voice heard. 

Urge Arizona State Representatives to Vote "NO" on the SB1365 Striker Vape Bill. This bill will destroy businesses and lives, severely limiting your right to access vapor products in the state of Arizona.

PMTA Registry bills pose an existential threat to consumer choice, adult access, and the independent vape industry. You can also click here for additional information. 

Below is a list of members of the Ways and Means committee. Please contact them and make your opposition known.  

CONTACT NOW: Ways and Means Committee

• Neil Carter (District 15) Phone: 602-926-5761 Email: ncarter@azleg.gov
• Justin Heap (District 10) Phone: 602-926-4181 Email: jheap@azleg.gov
• Seth Blattman (District 9) Phone: 602-926-3996 Email: SBLATTMAN@azleg.gov
  
• M. Carbone (District 25) Phone: 602-926-4038 Email: MCARBONE@azleg.gov
• Quanta Crews (District 26) Phone: 602-926-3256 Email: QCREWS@azleg.gov
• T. Grantham (District 14) Phone: 602-926-4868 Email: TGRANTHAM@azleg.gov
• D. Livingston  (District 28) Phone: 602-926-4178 Email: DLIVINGSTON@azleg.gov
• Jennifer Pawlik (District 13) Phone: 602-926-3193 Email: JPAWLIK@azleg.gov
• Mariana Sandoval (District 23) Phone: 602-926-3740 Email: MSANDOVAL@azleg.gov

Talking Points

This is a fast developing. This Legislation not only protects but enhances the position of the Tobacco industry and threatens public health. Feel free to share the following points. 

• Your personal story about switching to vaping.
• SB 1365 Striker Amendment Bill will close down hundreds of small businesses and put hundreds of workers out of a job.
• Cigarette sales have increased in every state where strong anti-vaping legislation has been improved. 
• The state doesn’t need to carry water for the FDA by enforcing its disastrous anti-vaping regulations.
• FDA has illegally denied marketing orders for nearly 1 million products and is failing to move forward with authorizing others.
• Proponents of this bill are playing a factually inaccurate "Red Scare" card. All of the tobacco industry's vapes are manufactured in China, relying on components often made at the very same facilities as the disposable vapes they are vilifying.
• A study published last week in the Journal of Tobacco Induced Diseases estimated that less than 2% of adult vapers in 2023 were using products with FDA authorization.
• The FDA has a budget of over $700 million and the ability to work with the DOJ, USPS, etc. This bill is being introduced not because the FDA is powerless to stop these products, but because the FDA has declined to take the sort of draconian actions they have been lobbying for. The head of the FDA by no means loves vaping, but he also recognizes that mass shutdowns of vaping companies could send ex-smokers back to cigarettes.
• If the SB 1365 Striker Amendment Bill is enacted, consumers will only have access to a handful of obsolete products that have applications pending, or Big Tobacco products  authorized by FDA.
• Be brief, be kind, and say thank you

Inform your representative that by signing this vape ban bill they are creating a new, massive and unfunded government bureaucracy in Arizona WORSE than the Biden Administration's bloated FDA vaping regulation, which has already been declared ILLEGAL by the 11th Circuit and 5th Circuit Courts of Appeal. This process will restrict the freedoms that you and I value so deeply.

 Cost to Consumer

What You Need to Know

If the SB 1365 Striker Amendment Bill is enacted, consumers will only have access to a handful of vape obsolete products that have applications pending, or Big Tobacco products  authorized by FDA.

FDA has illegally denied marketing orders for nearly 1 million vaping products and is failing to move forward with authorizing others.

The state will have to enforce the same FDA vaping regulations that have been called into question in just the last three months by:

• Seventy House GOP Members
• The Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals
• US Senators
• Center for Black Equity

Opponents of vaping are willing to destroy American jobs and lives by wrapping this hand-out to Big Tobacco as necessary to stop Chinese Influence. The tobacco industry's vape products are manufactured in China, often at the same facilities as those they are targeting. Using misleading language that their e-liquids are blended in the US.

There is but one group that benefits from banning vaping alternatives and limiting consumers to a handful of products made by the actual purveyors of cigarettes. 

Big Tobacco Protection Act Arizona 2024

This Striker bill is one of many cookie-cutter PMTA Registry Bills that Big Tobacco has unveiled nationally to ban vaping products that they do not produce.

Under the auspices of abiding by the FDA's Premarket Tobacco Application process, which their products have also failed to navigate, popular vaping products will be barred from the market. 

Please click on the link below and make your voice heard. PMTA Registry bills pose an existential threat to consumer choice, adult access, and the independent vape industry. You can also click here for additional information. 

Criticisms of PMTA Registry Bills

1. Structured so that the tobacco industry’s vape products remain on market, despite also not having received PMTA authorization, while barring their less expensive competition.
2. Serves as a flavor ban, denying adult vapers the flavors they prefer. An FDA funded study found cigarette sales increase in areas with flavor bans.
3. Bars easy to use disposable vapes, which are ideal for initiates and not coincidentally compete head-to-head with prefilled pod kits made by Big Tobacco.
4. Harms small businesses, vape shops and convenience stores, by removing high-volume and profitable products while leaving lower margin tobacco industry vapes on shelves.
5. Contrary to spirit of consumer choice and entrepreneurship, barring products released after 2016. 

Newest Vape Ban Scheme

Big Tobacco's newest scheme to eliminate the independent vape industry involves passing a series of PMTA Registry Bills at the state level across the nation. These laws will ban virtually every top selling vape product from the market, leaving only tobacco industry manufactured pod kits and a smattering of refillable e-liquid brands left standing.

PMTA Registry laws are already in place in Oklahoma, and Louisiana. CASAA refers to this cookie-cutter and self-serving piece of legislation as the “Protect Big Tobacco Act”. Make no mistake. They are a de facto vape ban.

Declines in smoking rates have started to stall ; if we're going to help more adults quit combustible cigarettes we have to embrace harm reduction and offer adult smokers modified risk nicotine products that don't have same risks as combusting tobacco 1/2 https://t.co/l3a1zmffqc

— Scott Gottlieb, MD (@ScottGottliebMD) February 26, 2024

When passed, PMTA Registry bills force vape shops to close, decimate the industry, deny adults access to vape products, and leave the tobacco industry with uncontested control of the market.

Arizona is the most recent target of this full-court press

Consumer Choice and Pocket Book Suffer Under PMTA Registration Laws

The price difference between independent vape industry products and those made by Big Tobacco is staggering. It costs over $200 to vape 30ml of e-liquid from a Vuse Alto. For Juul users, that cost increases to nearly $350 per 30ml.

A Lost Mary MT15000 Turbo costs a $63 to vape the same amount of e-liquid. The difference for the average user can equal a car lease or student loan payment. 

This table does not even account for the fact that a legally enforced monopoly will provide the tobacco industry with the freedom to raise prices further. What is the worst that can happen? Profitable cigarettes sold in place of vapes?

Under the Arizona PMTA Registry Bill, all vape products released after 2016 will be barred. This means every popular disposable will be gone, leaving Vuse, Juul and MyBlu with a virtual monopoly. A recent FDA study showed that flavor bans increase cigarette sales.

PMTA Registry Bills Nationwide

The tobacco industry has been unwilling or unable to compete with the independent vape industry in terms of price and innovation. Instead, they have opted for attempted regulatory capture of the FDA and lobbying politicians. 

Youth vaping rates have fallen every year since 2019, and the odds of a national flavor ban that would only benefit the tobacco industry seem more remote than ever. The FDA's PMTA debacle is under fire as Senators raise questions about the fairness of the entire process. 

To tilt the playing field decisively in their favor, they have devised state level restrictions based on the FDA’s flawed PMTA system. The only issue is that only a couple of defunct cigalikes have been approved by the FDA. As lobbying at the state level is a negligible expense for the deep-pocketed tobacco industry, these laws are expected to be proposed in every state.

The tobacco-industry lobbyists carefully worded their PMTA Registry scheme so that it bars products released after 2016, as the FDA has not approved the most popular tobacco industry vape pod products either.

With the FDA's shaky PMTA application process as the guideline, these laws essentially convert state governments into an enforcement arm for clueless federal regulators. Adult vapers, and smokers will pay the price for this political maneuvering and thousands of jobs will be destroyed in the process.

Consumer freedom, choice and your pocketbook will take a huge hit if the Arizona Vape Sales Ban is to pass.