Troutman Pepper Locke Tobacco Practice

An article by Bryan Haynes of the Troutman Sanders Tobacco practice appears in the January issue of Vapor Digest Magazine. The article, titled “Vapor Industry Regulation – Predications for 2015” discusses the regulatory landscape that could be facing the vapor industry during the upcoming year.  Aside from the FDA’s deeming regulations, which may become finalized during the coming year, Bryan speculates on the likelihood of additional regulations, primarily on a state level.

On December 19, Representative Henry Waxman, Senator Dick Durbin, and Representative Frank Pallone, Jr. sent letters to the twenty-nine State Attorneys General who were signatories of the August 8, 2014 letter to the FDA regarding regulation of e-cigarettes.  The December 19th letters lauded the continuing efforts of the State Attorneys General to encourage the regulation of e-cigarettes and called on them to classify e-cigarettes as “cigarettes” under the Master Settlement Agreement (“MSA”). Such classification would, among other things, impose cigarette advertising restrictions on vapor products.

On December 16, the FDA issued warning letters to six online retailers for selling “across state lines a tobacco product subject to a Not Substantially Equivalent (NSE) Order.”  Once an NSE order has been issued for a particular tobacco product by the FDA’s Center for Tobacco Products, the products are considered “misbranded and adulterated” and therefore cannot be sold, marketed, or distributed.