[Congressional Record Volume 166, Number 4 (Wednesday, January 8, 2020)]
[Senate]
[Pages S74-S75]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]



                              E-Cigarettes

  Mr. President, for many years, I have had a battle on with the 
tobacco lobby. It is personal. I lost my father to lung cancer when I 
was 14 and he was 53. I watched and stood by his bedside for literally 
100 days as he languished and ultimately died from lung cancer. He 
smoked two packs of cigarettes a day.
  When I came to the U.S. House of Representatives, I was determined to 
try to do something about the deaths that were being caused by tobacco 
products across America. I proposed a measure, which seemed pretty 
modest at the time, that banned smoking on airplane flights. It was an 
inconvenience and a mess to get on a plane with the so-called smoking 
and nonsmoking sections. So I thought: Let's get rid of it once and for 
all.
  It was quite a battle in the House of Representatives. We passed it 
by a handful of votes, to ban smoking on airplanes. Luckily, I found a 
great colleague and friend, former Senator Frank Lautenberg of New 
Jersey, who took up the cause on the floor of the Senate, and we banned 
smoking on airplanes over 25 years ago.
  I didn't know that it was anything more than elimination of an 
inconvenience while people took airplane flights. It turned out to be 
much more. It turned out to be a tipping point. People across America 
said: If it is unhealthy to breathe in second-hand smoke on an 
airplane, how about trains? How about buses? How about offices? How 
about hospitals? How about restaurants?
  At the end of the day, we know what happened. If someone walked into 
your home or your place of business and lit up a cigarette, you would 
look at them and think: Where are you from? We don't do that anymore.
  We certainly don't do it without asking permission. But that is what 
has happened in America.
  We had to fight the tobacco lobby every step of the way, and we have 
had some success. The number of young people who were using tobacco 
cigarette products declined dramatically, from over 20 percent to 
around 8 percent. We were winning the battle because these tobacco 
companies were recruiting our kids at an early age with a nicotine 
addiction they couldn't shake later in life.
  Guess what happened. The tobacco companies invented a new product 
that is called e-cigarette, or vaping. If you think I am making this 
connection up, take a look at the largest vendor of vaping devices, 
JUUL, and look at the major shareholder of JUUL. It turns out to be 
Altria, which also turns out to be a major tobacco company.
  Now the tobacco companies have decided that since kids don't 
gravitate toward tobacco cigarettes, they will give them an 
alternative. The alternative is an e-cigarette, or a vaping device.
  You know what has happened, Mr. President, in your State and in my 
mine? High school kids are taking up this vaping addiction in numbers 
unimaginable. The latest report suggests that almost 29 percent of high 
school students across the United States are currently vaping. What 
they are doing is using pods and flavor pods with nicotine included and 
using an electronic device to inhale this vapor and blow it out. 
Unfortunately, in inhaling it into their lungs, they are also inhaling 
nicotine and developing a terrible addiction.
  Students from New York came to my office a few weeks ago, and they 
said: Senator, don't kid yourself. It is not 28 or 29 percent. It is 
over 50 percent of students who are vaping today, and they are 
desperate to buy these flavor pods and to buy these new JUUL devices. 
When the teacher in a classroom steps out, they are all vaping, right 
there in the classroom. They do it in the restrooms and the classrooms 
and the cafeterias and outside the schools. They are doing desperate 
things to be able to afford these devices.
  On September 11 of this year, President Trump and the First Lady held 
a press conference in the Oval Office. Though I have been critical of 
this President for many things, I applauded what they said. They 
recognized this vaping crisis, and they said that we are going to stop 
it and that we are going to make the moves necessary to make sure that 
these flavor pods that are enticing children are finally taken from the 
market.
  I couldn't believe my ears when I heard it. Here was President Trump 
stepping up to do the right thing. Perhaps he and his wife, as a father 
and a mother of a teenager, understand this better than some. But 
whatever the reason, whatever the motivation, they came forward with 
what I thought was the best proposal: End the flavor pods once and for 
all.
  After they made their announcements, the vaping industry went to 
work. They started buying ads on FOX--naturally, that is where the 
President watches television--and they started saying to the people 
that it was unfair to take away these flavor pods.
  Sadly, these flavor pods, when you look at them very closely, are 
just an enticement for young people to use this product.
  Now the vaping industry tries to argue: Well, wait a minute. People 
who want tobacco cigarettes ought to have vaping as an alternative. It 
is safer.
  Well, marginally it may be, if that were the end of the story. But it 
turns out that vaping device is also becoming an enticement for young 
people to use flavor pods and to develop this addiction to nicotine of 
vaping devices. It is impossible to argue that some veteran smoker of 
tobacco products is going to be enticed to vaping if he can buy candy 
flavors, bubble gum flavors, fruit flavors, or other flavors. Can you 
imagine some 50-year-old who has been smoking Marlboro for years, and 
says: Man, if I could just get my hands on some Unicorn milk flavor 
pods, I would give up tobacco and move to e-cigarettes.
  We know better. These pods are designed to entice children.
  (Mr. ROMNEY assumed the chair.)
  We waited to see what would happen after the President's September 
announcement. We were lucky to have one of our own colleagues, from the 
State of Utah, who has now taken the Chair, who was present at the 
meeting with the President on the issue of vaping. I salute him for his 
friendship and leadership on this issue.
  Last week, after delays, President Trump finally announced a plan to 
ban some of the e-cigarette flavors that are hooking our kids on 
nicotine. Within 30 days, some flavored e-cigarette pods and cartridges 
will be removed from the market. This is an important step, but it is 
not nearly enough. For instance, menthol pods are exempt, so I am 
afraid kids are just going to move to JUUL's menthol flavor. Further, 
liquid e-cigarette flavors that are used in open-tank vaping shops are 
also exempt. The vaping shops are still in business, unaffected by this 
new policy of the administration. Liquid nicotine is sold in flavors 
like Gummy Bear, Whip Cream, Sugar Cookie, and Unicorn Milk. These 
flavors, definitely intended for kids, will stay under President 
Trump's new policy.
  This week's announcement is not what the President said would happen 
in the Oval Office a few months ago. That is why the public health 
community and this Senator are so disappointed. We know the President 
decided to water down the e-cigarette flavor ban. Heavy lobbying by Big 
Tobacco and Big Vape were behind it. When announcing this new 
restriction, President Trump said some words that may tell the story. 
He said:
  We have to protect our families. At the same time, it's a big 
industry. We want to protect the industry.
  Protect the vaping industry? It makes sense why these companies

[[Page S75]]

wanted the President to backtrack on his promise. They make a lot of 
money off our kids. They addict them, and the kids spend money because 
of the addiction. Why doesn't it make sense for the President to stand 
up to Big Tobacco and Big Vaping on behalf of our kids across America?
  The fight is not over. Fewer than 4 percent of adults use e-
cigarettes, while 30 percent, at least, of high school kids across 
America are using them. Now the FDA--with a new leader, Dr. Stephen 
Hahn--has to come off the sidelines and do their job to protect the 
kids. By court order, all e-cigarette companies will have to submit 
applications to the Food and Drug Administration in May if they want to 
keep their devices and flavors on the market. If they do not submit an 
application in May, they will have to come off the market immediately. 
The FDA must enforce this fully. For companies that do submit an 
application, the FDA has up to 1 year to decide whether they stay in 
the market. The FDA must reject the applications of any vaping products 
that are clearly designed to appeal to children, period. And if they 
are significantly used by children, they should be taken off the 
market.
  I have told Commissioner Hahn that the FDA must evaluate these 
applications based on science, not anecdotes. What matters is that e-
cigarette companies prove their health claims, which, to date, they 
have never been able to do. Do e-cigarettes actually help smokers quit 
cigarettes? Are they actually safe? Or are they, in fact, hooking 
children on nicotine? Those are the important questions that should be 
answered with science, not with politics.
  There are ways to preserve e-cigarette access for adult smokers 
without allowing an entire generation of kids to be hooked on nicotine. 
This means getting rid of all of the flavors, taking illegal products 
off the market immediately, and rejecting e-cigarette applications that 
fail to show a strong public health benefit.
  To date, the FDA has not been as active or aggressive as it should. 
For the sake of our children and the families who love them, it is time 
for the FDA to get off the sidelines and make sure that we do 
everything in our power, including in Congress, to make certain that 
this epidemic--and the FDA came up with the word--this epidemic of e-
vaping and e-cigarettes comes to an end in America.
  I yield the floor.
  I suggest the absence of a quorum.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. The clerk will call the roll.
  The senior assistant legislative clerk proceeded to call the roll.
  Mrs. BLACKBURN. Mr. President, I ask unanimous consent that the order 
for the quorum call be rescinded.
  The PRESIDING OFFICER. Without objection, it is so ordered.