North Carolina – What started as an education bill in the state legislature was recently passed and signed into law by the governor but has little to do with education. Instead, it concerns the regulation of tobacco products, more specifically vaping products.
“There is a huge public ‘fire storm’ coming once everyone realizes that big tobacco and our lawmakers have effectively banned 99% of all vapor products in North Carolina,” explained Michael William, owner of High Country CBD in Mars Hill.
The bill will go into law on January 1, 2025, and will take several months to effect. However, the US Supreme Court has agreed to take a case (the Triton case) that would affect the law. It seems the law was enacted because the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), on its own, took the power to turn down nearly 25 million products not produced by big tobacco.
“I sincerely believe the Supreme Court will stop the FDA’s arbitrary denial of 25 million market approval applications with the Triton case coming next session, after the Chevron Doctrine reversal,” said Williams. “Congress has never given FDA authorization to effectively ban every vapor product application, except Big Tobacco vapor applications.”
Williams explains that his business is regulated by Alcohol, Tobacco & Firearms (ATF), which pays him regular visits.
“When you read the Fifth Circuit and their opinion, it was obvious they believed the FDA was railroading all vape, but favoring big tobacco,” said Wiiliams. Asked if there was collusion between the FDA and Big Tobacco, Williams said, “There’s no doubt. Between big tobacco and the FDA, there’s no doubt.”
So why did the state pass a law if it is a federal government agency that oversees his business? “This is God’s honest truth from my perspective; big tobacco has a lot of power in this state, and when got every one of the senators voting for that, like 98 percent of the voting for it. It’s like, wait a minute, guys. You just took care of your buddies in Raleigh (talking about big tobacco). That’s what it looks like to me.”
Williams is not far off on the vote; in the Senate, it was 41-0, and in the House, the vote was 99-15, or about 90 percent. Both Democrats and Republicans voted for the bill.
Williams learned of the bill by a group called CASAA, a vaping advocacy group. “This bill bullied its way through the NC House as part of H900. Big tobacco and their six lobbyists forced this bill to be voted on without making the public aware that they were considering changes to vaping regulations and without politicians having an understanding of what this bill means to the people of North Carolina if implemented,” states part of the email from Wholesale Vaping Supply and citing CASAA.
Williams believes that once the case is in the hands of the Supreme Court, the court will overturn the FDA’s unilateral ban, as it did recently with Relentless v. Department of Commerce and Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo, which ended the Chevron Doctrine, ending the long-standing power of the bureaucrats in Washington, DC.
In an article at SCOTUSblog.com by Amy Howem she states, “In a major ruling, the Supreme Court on Friday cut back sharply on the power of federal agencies to interpret the laws they administer and ruled that courts should rely on their own interpretation of ambiguous laws. The decision will likely have far-reaching effects across the country, from environmental regulation to healthcare costs.”
Full Discloser: High Country is an advertiser with this newspaper.