In congress and at the white house on the issue of vaping and underage use of ecigarettes. We are joined by andrew, who covers health care for cq roll call. Tell us why underage vaping became a bigger issue in 2019. Andrew i think it was a combination of factors that really drove this to the front of the policy debate this year. One was just a year over year increases in the number of teens who are reporting ecigarette use. Thats been increasing for several years, but 2019, we saw another significant increase over last year. Another was interrelated, but sort of distinct issue that we saw, starting over the summer with vaping related illnesses that were beginning to emerge, that weve now seen thousands injured and dozens dead from this. Thats related to illicit thc vaping, which is distinct from the problem of ecigarette use. But the urgency of those illnesses i think really prompted policymakers to want to respond more broadly to the vaping issues were dealing with in the u. S. Host and the Administration Starts the new year with an announcement about vaping and ecigarettes. Andrew, youre covering this story. What did they say . Andrew so, the Administration Says that in early february, products like juul, which are the most popular among young people, use nicotine filled pods and cartridges. Previously, juul had been available in flavors like mint, mango, fruit, and otherwise. The companys already taken those products off the market a few months back because of public pressure. And anticipation of flavor restrictions. But products similar to juul, other things that are pod or cartridgebased, they will have to take their flavors off the market. The other type of ecigarettes products available, there are these devices that have tanks that the users can refill them with liquid nicotine themselves. These tend to be more popular among adults. Theyre harder to conceal than products like juul, and the shops that sell the flavors for those will continue to operate as they currently have as long as they have strict age verification procedures in place, and as long as theyre not selling flavors obviously marketing to children. They wouldnt be able to sell things like flavors based on cereal or Something Like that. So, those shops will continue to operate as they normally have. Host President Trump was at maralago over the holiday break, and on new years eve, he previewed the announcement, speaking with reporters. Lets take a listen. Pres. Trump yeah, the vaping is coming out. Were going to be announcing it very shortly. Some know about what were doing. We have to protect our families. At the same time, its a big industry. We want to protect the industry. Were taking off certain flavors for a period of time. Were going to protect our families, our children, and our industry. Hopefully, if things are safe, they will be going quickly back onto the market. They will be checked. People have died from this. Theyve died from vaping. We think we understand why, but were doing a very exhaustive examination and hopefully everything will be back to the market very shortly. Look, vaping can be good from the standpoint you look at ecigarettes, you stop smoking. Thats a big advantage. Well be working to get them on the market quickly, but we have to protect the children. We have to protect the families. Same time, we have a very big industry. Were going to take care of the industry. Host were going to show you some of President Trumps public deliberations on the issue later. Right now, part of a hearing from july. Well hear from High School Students and their parents. Two of the students say a representative of the ecigarette company juul gave a presentation to their ninth grade classroom and said that ecigarettes are totally safe. Im meredith berkman, and i represent parents against vaping ecigarettes, a Grassroots Group founded over a year ago by three concerned moms. We already have groups of activated parents across the country, from california to new york, and places in between. We have people with us today from texas, from georgia, virginia, new york, new jersey, etc. My cofounders are behind me with members of our families. Between us, we have nine kids between ages seven and 19. Along with our friend mimi, also here, we created paved in response to the pave to the juuling epidemic that has seemed to come out of nowhere. Its one of the most Serious Public Health crises of country has faced in decades. Our goal is to give voice to this 3. 6 million teens who are vaping, most of them juuling. This most recent figure is outdated. There was a 78 percent rise in the use of these products by High School Students, and 48 rise in use by middle school students. And experts believe the new figures will likely be much higher because nothing has happened to have them go down. We hear from desperate parents every day, who contact us seeking resources, information, and help further juul dependent, nicotineaddicted kids, but there is not yet treatment for this addiction. I will share very briefly just one or two stories, because theyre heartbreaking and they come from every state represented here on the panel, and probably every state of people in this room. From massachusetts, our pave advocate speaking about her son, cade, a hockey player, described how he developed a cough and was not able to breathe while skating. He had extreme bouts of anger, a very common thing people report. The home environment was toxic. It turns out that kate has it turns out that cade has restrictive lung disease. He needs inhalers and oral steroids. Hes been smoking a pod a day, the equivalent of a pack of cigarettes a day for three years. Kelly from North Carolina is here with her son, luca, whose addiction was so severe he spent 39 days as an inpatient in a Rehab Facility in california. Kelly said, we began living with a stranger. Our straight a students grades dropped to f. It turned out our 14yearold had a Substance Abuse problem and that substance was juul. And now i want to share a personal story, a story about how juul went after our kids and their friends by coming into their School Without the knowledge of the school or of us concerned parents, juul sent a representative to talk to our kids about its product under the guise of education. On april 3, 2017, my then 15yearold friend caleb, whos here, told me there had been an antiaddiction talk. The teachers left the room and the man gave a confusing talk about juul, telling them it was not for kids but for adults. It was much safer than cigarettes. The fda would approve it any day. When he was done, caleb and his friend philip went up to talk to him. He repeated juul was for adults, not kids. Then he took out this slick then he took out this sleek looking juul, showed the boys how it worked, and called it the iphone of vapes. And thats when we moms decided to fight back. We discovered a few months before that our kids were juuling at home, right under our noses, which is also very common. It doesnt mean youre a bad parent. Its self by design. We knew that nicotine was harmful to kids brains. And as we researched and put pieces together, we learned that juuls Deceptive Behavior seemed to be part of this marketing strategy. In california, a retired superintendent was offering schools in massachusetts money that they would implement the antijuul curriculum that they were offering on juuls behalf. We came across the stanford medical schools tobacco prevention toolkit with a disclaimer that we immediately realized was a reference to juul taking information it shouldnt have. None of this is surprising. As i said, juul is stealth by design. Juul says it no longer restocks resale orders of flavors that research has proven are harming the kids. Yet just the other day, in a one block radius in two different stores, i was able to buy these mango pods that juul says are no longer on the market, but they are still online. And thats the problem. If juul really wants to slow the youth epidemic and keep young kids from starting, they will remove all flavors from the market, including menthol and mint, the most popular kids flavors, and stop spending millions on lobbyists to oppose sensible legislation that pave parents and our Coalition Partners are fighting for all over this country, to restrict youth access to juul and other products. We hope todays hearing motivates members of congress on both sides. We all care about kids to hold juul accountable, not only for the epidemic, for its predatory practices and causing harm. It is a moral issue. If we dont take action now, we face an entire generation addicted to nicotine, who are human guinea pigs. Thank you, miss berkman. First of all, after you discovered that a presenter representing juul gave a closed assembly at your childrens school, we researched the issue and formed an Advocacy Group to inform parents around the country about the dangers of ecigarette use. Thank you for your continued advocacy. As a parent of three Young Children myself, including a teenager, i was shocked to hear juul had access to children without the presence of teachers or administrators, and without parental permission. Juul continues to partner with youth organizations across the country, so its important to understand what outreach looks like on their part. Mrs. Berkman and mrs. Furman, id like to ask a couple of questions from your sons, if thats ok. Yes. Philip and caleb, can you come to the table for a couple minutes . Id like to first address caleb. Caleb, what grades were you and philip in in the year of the juul presentation . Ninth grade. Ninth grade. Thank you. What where students told before the presentation began . We were told we were having a Mental Health addiction seminar that we have three times a year. The teachers are told to leave the room so it is a safe space for kids to talk. Did most of your classmates believe juul was safe prior to the presentation . I think many kids were already juuling and had their doubts. But i think a lot of kids still thought it was possibly dangerous. Did the presenter ever mention his connection to juul, and where your teachers in the room when he spoke . He did mention the connection to juul and my teacher was not in the room. Did the presenter say juul was safe . Yes. Did the presenter call juul totally safe more than once . Yes. What impact did those totally safe comments have on your classmates, some of whom may have already started vaping . For my classmates who are already vaping, it was a sigh of relief because now they could vape without any concern. Where there kids who had never been juuling that were more likely to try after hearing it was totally safe . I cant say for sure but i believe that after this meeting, kids were more inclined to vape because now they thought it was just a flavor device that didnt have any harmful substances in it. You and philip approached the presenter when the assembly concluded. What motivated you to even approach him in the first place . I believed the presenter was sending mixed messages by saying juul is totally safe, and following up every totally safe statement with, but we dont want you as customers. I saw a mixed message being sent and i believe the presenter was playing on the rebellious side of teens, who when they are told not to do something, they are more likely to do it. Philip, let me ask you a couple questions. What was your experience speaking to the presenter . So, we went up and talked to him and caleb asked a question about what can you do if your friend is addicted to nicotine . Philip, were you addicted to juul at the time of this presentation . I was. Was caleb referring to you . He was. How did the presenter answer . Since caleb was not specific on what kind of nicotine he was addicted to, whether it was in ecigarette or cigarettes, the speaker thought he was talking about cigarettes. He said he should mention juul to his friend because thats a safer alternative than smoking cigarettes and it would be better for the kid to use. So let me get this straight, he wanted you to switch from a combustible cigarette to juul . Yes. Did he demonstrate the product . He didnt use it but he did show it to us. Ok, this is very disturbing behavior, to say the least. A person connected to juul pulled out a juul device to demonstrate its safety to teenagers, and then lied about the product being totally safe. Did he say anything else about whether the government had approved juul . He mentioned that the fda was about to come out and say that juul was 99 safer than cigarettes, and that would happen very soon, and that it was in fda approval while the talk was going on. Thank you, caleb and philip. Let me ask dorian, phillips mother, to say a couple words here. Dorian, thank you for coming today. Your son philip just stated he was addicted to juul. How did his addiction impact your family . It was difficult. At first, we didnt understand what was going on. He was interested in so many things, from surfing to cooking to his little sister. And i started to find these flash drives and these green plastic caps in his pockets. And i didnt really know what it was at first. So he kept saying they belonged to a friend. We would have fights about it. I figured out what it was because i googled the name on the side. It was difficult. He changed overnight. He started spending a lot of time in his room in the dark. He became moody. We had a very contentious relationship. I became very suspicious, obviously. And i think he didnt really understand what was going on himself, and neither did we. Thank you, dorian. Let me now recognize Ranking Member cloud for five minutes of questioning. Thank you, chairman. Ms. Berkman, im curious to the reaction. I assume you approached the school board, the principal. What was the reaction . The school had no idea that the outside group had brought a juul representative into the school. The school had hired a group yes. And we believe the outside group was naive, definitely, but in good faith. Because when i called to ask about this presentation, the staffer who answered the phone said, oh, you found the right person. I was researching antijuul education online, and i came across the name of a woman named julie henderson, who was listed then and no longer on the juul website as a youth prevention coordinator. Then she called and this woman says, i have the perfect person, and sent allie. Ok, thank you. Doctor . Could you explain the difference, from a health perspective, between a cigarette and an ecigarette . Between a traditional cigarette and an ecigarette . Is there one . Yeah, there are many differences. Traditional cigarettes consist of a preparation of tobacco leaves, which when burned, create smoke and contains roughly 7000 different chemicals, most of which are not good for the human body. Ecigarettes contain far fewer ingredients in addition to nicotine, which are commonly found ingredients in foodstuffs and some flavorings. And this, in general, the difference in number of compounds in ecigarettes versus cigarettes makes ecigarettes, in general, safer, although they can probably vary from product to product. A lot of the safety of these ecigarettes depend on temperature controls. So, for example, if products have adequate temperature control, they tend to be less toxic. Ok, weve known cigarettes for a while cause cancer. Talking about prevention, i remember in third grade seeing lungs sitting in a jar that had somebody who had passed away from cigarette use. But i guess what im trying to get down to is, what are the Health Effects on the combustible side of it and what are the effects of the nicotine side . Yeah, and thats an important point to raise. If we look at nicotine in and of itself, its not riskfree but its probably a lot less toxic compared to the other chemicals that come out of cigarette smoke. For example, nicotine probably does not cause cancer. It may have some small effects on existing cardiovascular disease and so forth. The brain might have to adapt to having a drug on board, neural adaptations, which are true for any drug. But the nicotine itself is not the culprit when it comes to things like cancers, at least as we seem to have a competing set of facts here. The chose team e cigarette use and then you mentioned that a lot of that i guess is transitional or is it not, is a new use . That acould clarify little bit for us to have a better understanding of what is new use and whats transitional use. That is an important question. I dont think we have a good handle on that yet because a lot of surveys we look at our what are crosssectional meanings. Its a slice in time and we see kids that report to us they are using one or two days or every day or so forth. And what we need are studies the track kids over time to see whether the ones who are starting up one or two days go once again and we dont know what the real implications are of these different patterns of use and i want to emphasize the concern that kids should not be trying these products and shouldnt be using them, certainly not on a frequent basis. Nobody knows what it does to the human long to breathe in and over and over. We will find out years from now the results. The flavoring industry knows that with compounds we put into our food that are safe in your intestinal tract. When you breathe them in, for example the classic example is buttered popcorn. The compounds in the industrial setting caused severe restrictive lung disease on the part of the dog industrial workers. We are taking a wide variety. The ecigarette industry has taken flavored chemicals, thousands of different ones, mix them with glycol and they are exposed over and over in the lungs. We just dont know yet the longterm results. There is no doubt in my mind that vaping is safer than conventional smoking, but that doesnt mean its safe. I now recognize congresswoman ib leave congresswoman tla for five minutes. Thank you. As a mother i can sense your frustration. Being here a short seven months and kind of hearing, i dont call it some color rhetoric to discredit a lot of the things that we are pushing for. I just want to know you have the truth on your side. Be stronger for that. We dont need more studies. We already know the truth here. In the few years after it was founded in 2015, it dominated the market. Three targeted Advertising Campaign that seem to be a Winning Strategy as it now accounts for 76 of the u. S. Ecigarette market. It is simply staggering. What i find troubling is that the same timeframe the rate of teenage nicotine addiction skyrocketed. Increase ind 75 ecigarette use among High School Students from 2017 to 2018. Meits no coincidence to that teenagers who use ecigarettes on most exclusively refer to the activity is drooling. Ing. Uul you study the marketing practices. Based on your expertise, should juul have been aware its Marketing Campaign would appeal to youth and teenagers . Absolutely. Fads dont happen by accident. The beatles and beanie babies were products of very clever promotional activities and so is juul. Juul engaged ad agencies which are professional and ad agencies understand very well the difference between marketing to baby boomers like newspapers and radio and broadcast tv and gen z ers. Ad agencies follow the instructions of their client, they dont work independently. The company knew very well when it chose to use instagram who the heaviest users of instagram were. If the underage youth by and large. In the inside report for the New York Times validates it. I dont think theres any question that juul knew its actions were protected waiting were perpetuating the epidemic. Have you ever met the founders . Yes. I met james in my Research Team we went up to juul in august. He thanked us for the database we had a 50,000 traditional tobacco ads online. He said they were very helpful as they designed juuls advertising. This struck us so much that as we left the meeting, the very first thing we talked about was how surprising it was he indicated juul was grounded in traditional advertising. We know very well having studied tobacco advertising that juuls marketing faithfully recapitulates the methods used by the Tobacco Industry to target young people and that includes brands such as marlborough which the closely emulated, american spirit, newport, there are direct derivatives in juul advertising. So its Mission Statement asserts it aims to improve the lives of the worlds one billion adult smokers. Do its marketing practices which are studied for years aligned with that statement stated mission . Not for its first 3. 5 years. Already the youth that was breaching. Brad became more calibrated to an adult audience and the channels they used as well. They have now switched campaigns depicting middleaged and older adults. Its an printed newspaper and on television and no longer they are promoting on social media. This only happened long after it was a youth epidemic and it was because of the unwanted intense attention by regulators but also interestingly as it was pointed out when we visited with them, there was concern about investors. Particularly National Companies Like Fidelity who certainly didnt want to be associated with products that work widely seen it always leads to profits. Last november they deleted their instagram as you account to do. But the explosion of the marketing had already had an impact on youth. How do we continue to see initial Marketing Campaign influence on kids on social media today . Off its ownng marketing didnt stop all of the branded hashtags. In the first three years and five months, june 2015 to november 2018, there were about a quarter of a million posts mostly by young people with the. Since last november to now it doubled to over half a million. What is important to note astounded me the most is they deleted facebook and instagram but their twitter followers, half of them are under the age of 18. If i might say just because you delete them doesnt mean it never happened. Thank you so much. A few moments ago we heard from the medical School Professor testified that juuls advertising was based on the early advertising of the cigarette industry. The next day, and executive denied that. My name is james montys. Labs andi founded juul i now serve as the chief product officer of the company. Im quite grateful for the opportunity to be here today and address you all. From the moment madame and i began the journey that would lead to the system, we were clearing our goal to help improve the lives of adult smokers. We are proud of the progress weve made to that goal. We never wanted any nonnicotine user and certainly nobody underage to ever use juul products. The data clearly shows a significant number of underage americans are doing so. , ouris a serious problem company has no higher priority in fighting it. To understand our stance on vaping comments understood its important understand how kim underway for in the first place. We smoked, we tried to quit and we failed. We were on our way to becoming one of the nearly 500,000 americans who die each year from smoking related disease. For us, giving up smoking required an alternative which did not exist at the time. We founded juul labs to invent one. The product we developed promise to do it no Previous Technology has done. Smokers stop smoking combustible cigarettes on a widespread and consistent basis. Findt behavioral studies that more than half of adult smokers who purchased and used juul products switch completely from smoking cigarettes within six months. A fact that we could not be more proud of. That study aligns with real world experience in 2018, cigarette sales declined. The fastest rate of decline in a decade. Simply,rman thomas put we are not big tobacco. We are here to eliminate its product. The cigarette. Are different from tobacco manufacturers is fundamental. First, our product does not involve burning tobacco. Which on leases 7000 chemicals at least 250 of which are known to be harmful. They do contain nicotine. Is nots addictive, but directly responsible for the many diseases associated with smoking. Public Health Authority such as Public Health england have concluded that vaping is a fraction the risk of smoking, at least 95 less harmful and of negligible risk to bystanders. Second, our companies incentives are totally different from those of Tobacco Companies. Traditional Cigarette Companies face a saturated concentrated Global Market. 0. 3 of thehed just Global Market of one billion smokers. 70 of whom want to quit actively. Our incentive is to help them achieve their goal of transitioning from cigarettes. It is an astonishing Business Opportunity no doubt, but it is a historic opportunity for Public Health. Underage use of our products does not advance that goal. It imperils that. Third, unlike cigarette manufacturers, our company swiftly acknowledges and acts upon Public Health data. We embrace appropriate regulations and we have acted voluntarily to restrict your own practices in service of Public Health goals. Unilaterally ceasing sale of products to retail stores, investing her own funds to drive retailers and clients and proactively advocating for raising the legal age to buy our own product. We believe that if the steps we have already taken became the category wide standard, it would go a long way to driving down underage access and usage of vapor products. More, weepared to do have met with many of our sharpest critics and have sought the suggestions for how we can improve. We remain open. In the american public. We are grateful for the opportunity to discuss these important topics and look forward to answering your questions. A professor from Stanford University testified under oath before the subcommittee that you confirmed to him that you reviewed stanfords Online Library of cigarette advertising and found designedhelpful as you juuls advertising. You did in fact meet with the doctor, didnt you . I did, but i did not make that statement. So you are under oath denying that you made that statement . I think that unfortunately the doctor may have misheard my commentary. In fact the resource he compiled is a useful resource back when adam and i were at stanford, we were very interested in understanding more about the historical bad actions of Tobacco Companies and at that point we were very interested in using his research to understand exactly what bad actions those Tobacco Companies have taken to familiarize ourselves with how not to run a business. So you deny his statement under oath. I would like to put his assertion in context. Please show advertisement one. Sir, these images you see on advertisement one contain a few different images. Right over here is a picture of marlborough in the middle of the original juul design that you came up with. And then on the far right is the most recent juul design. Advertising,our you and entered into a settlement with Phillip Morris and in this in a set of board minutes from august 12, 2016 you produced to us, it says due to requirements outlined in the pmi settlement, weve removed all juul branding that uses triangle and diamond shapes. Pmi is Philip Morris international right . Thats correct. You subtly lawsuit with them where they allege you copied marlboroughs trademark how much did you pay is part of the settlement with Phillip Morris . Zero dollars. So involve no exchange of money but required that you abandon the triangles and diamonds which are very similar boros . We never design the product look anything like it. Do you deny that look similar . I do deny you are comparing them. With all due respect mr. Chairman, you are comparing a piece of packaging for a piece of product hardware. The last thing we wanted was to be confused with any major Tobacco Company. A due to board minutes requirements outlined in the settlement we removed all branding that uses triangles and diamond shapes. Do you deny that thats what was said in your board minutes . I do not deny that. We would request that you provide the subcommittee with the pmi Settlement Agreement within two weeks. Would you do that, please . I will have to get back to you on that. I dont see why that would be a problem but i will check with my colleagues. Great. And we will subpoena it if that is required. The doctor testified that marlborough is the leading youth initiated youth initiation cigarette. So it says something that they chose something to emulate. Lets look at the flavors highlighted in this ad. As you can see on the right are the marlboro products. On the left are the juul products. You notice the combo the colors are very similar between the two companies products. And one very interesting thing that i would like to point out is the flavors. Lets talk about the flavors for a second. , mango andnt, creme virginia tobacco. Which flavor is currently juuls topselling product . Currently after we pulled voluntarily all of our flavored products off of market, now theyre only available on our website with double age verification, the topselling product i believe is mint shortly followed by virginia tobacco. That is right. Mint accounts for about 74 of your companys sales. And meant is a flavor obviously. Its a mental based product meant to appeal to consumers using mental based cigarettes. Its a mental based flavor. That is correct menthol based flavor. That is correct. Can you please put ad three up. Took out au fullpage ad in the Washington Post. You said taking flavored products out of stores and i think thats what you alluded to a moment ago. The problem here that i see is you left what you call the menthol based flavors in the stores, correct . Such as mint. That is correct. So mint is still a flavor that is available overthecounter in the stores 20cording to the 2016 population assessment for tobacco health, 96. 1 of 12 to 17yearolds started with a flavored product. Percentally it found 97 of current youth ecigarette users used a flavored ecigarette in the past month such as mint. Flavors hook kids and though you say you took all the flavors out of the stores, you left the mint flavors. Mr. Chairman, with all due respect, i think what you will find is this was these are unprecedented actions we took, we heard these concerns and i agree with you that we should be concerned and ever since we first heard these concerns we look to ourselves without new regulation coming and being imposed upon us we took this action in ourselves. The product we pulled from market, the flavored products we pulled from market represented more than 50 of our business at the time. I cant imagine a more responsive and proactive step that we could take to exactly the point you are making. But when you pull the other flavors off the market, mint took their place. Mint is a flavor and it took the place of all the other flavors. Do you disagree with that . I do. Unfortunately was mostly taken the place of those is elicit illegal products. Is mint in your stores or not . It is. Thats all i need to know. Its a flavored product, it still in stores. With that i will now recognize Ranking Member the Ranking Member. Haso you feel that juul ever purposely used deceptive Marketing Tactics to convey that their products are not harmful . No, never. What was the purpose of creating fruity flavored pods . Tothe purpose of flavors is create a more efficacious solution. The mission of the company is to improve the lives of the billion adult smokers around the world and we know 70 of those people want to quit and there were a number of tools we used as we were designing the platform in the first place. With empathetic researcher smokers where we could see opportunities to make a product that could be superior to cigarettes. It would make them ultimately obsolete. Studies and plenty of studies that weve run now is that flavor products 54 of adult smokers who pick up juul and use juul quit smoking entirely after a sixmonth period. That number continues to go up as we look more longitudinally. That number is much higher by as much as 30 when this consumers have access to flavored products. So you essentially created the company to disrupt the cigarette industry. Smoking cigarettes is the leading cause of preventable death on earth. It kills almost 500,000 americans every year and it cost us 300 billion. Are you concerned about the number of teenagers who report vaping or using juul . I could not be more concerned about that. Was your product ever intended for underage use . Absolutely not. 100 not. So you never intended on that having the rates of underage usage that it apparently has. Unfortunately, the long history of tobacco is also the long history of underage use of Tobacco Products. As long as Tobacco Products have been available, underage consumers have access those and use them. I was one of those underage users. I bought them illegally and i use them. In building these products not only are they not designed for youth, it imperils the business for youth to use these products. Work withed to do is hopefully this committee, every researcher and everyone we can create hands on to help industry practices. In what they should be and what they can be. Our cost of preventing underage usage is a priority to juul . There is no higher priority for this company. What steps are you taking to prevent this . Last year november 2018, going back even further, we have taken steps as weve learned about these problems. Most of the criticism they receive doesnt come directly from the company. We welcome that and we would love to work more directly with people that have critiques of the company. But when we hear the criticism we take action. These escalating steps really move, one that i really want to highlight in november of 2018 we pulled over 50 of our revenue off of the market. Proactively. There was nothing that required us to do that. But we were hearing a lot of critique about flavored products. What we left on the market were tobacco based products. The same way cigarettes exist on the market. Have you been working with the fda to institute any changes to the Regulatory Environment to prevent youth use of your product . There have been some conversations with the fda where they provided some guidance on in particular how when we want to better issue, itssage very difficult for us to study youth directly. So one of the ways in which i think weve had the most valuable or positive relationship thus far is just getting guidance from them on how we can better study usage. My time is expired. I want to take your statements in good faith. But unfortunately there is so much evidence of the controvert contrary. I hope you get give me some clarity. When your product into the market they contained 10 to 20 milligrams of liquid. The harshness in bad taste and then tripled the nicotine content over existing products, making juul the most potent ecigarette on the market. The fda cap to the 20 milligrams per milliliter of liquid , a third of your u. S. Product. With that cop you still sell a product in the eu and u. K. We do. Last year israel also cap nicotine content to 20 milligrams per milliliter the higher nicotine product a grave danger to Public Health. Plus 59 milligram per milliliter product was already on the product on the market there. He recalled that product and entered the market in israel with a 20 milligrams per milliliter product. So obviously juul has determined it can still make money selling a product with less dangerous levels. So do you think that at 20 milligrams per milliliter, juul can accomplish the mission of helping smokers to quit cigarettes . Let me provide a little bit of context. If you could answer. Concentration that you are talking about was designed to mimic never exceed the curvature i really just want a clear answer of can you achieve your stated mission of helping adult smokers to quit smoking conventional cigarettes using a 20 milligram per milliliter product . We would love to try. But you are already trying in every country except this one. Juul often cites the u. K. Study that ecigarettes may help people quit smoking but you failed to mention participants were using illiquid below the 20 milligram per milliliter number. Nowhere near the 59 level in your u. S. Product. Late last year as reported juul began developing a pod that would comply with 20 milligram per milliliter cap but would increase the voltage in temperatures of the device and therefore deliver more nicotine to the blood, is that accurate . Im not sure what youre referring to with voltage in temperatures. The actual delivery device were you are increasing the voltage and the temperature of the device instead of having a 59 milliliter milligrams per milliliter cap you would have your 20 and deliver a more potent Delivery System of nicotine into the bloodstream. Is that accurate . Sure ot im not aware. Its mind you dont know the answer. Are you aware this can make the pods even more addictive, heightening the risk for young people . If that were the case. . If we were to increase the voltage. And the temperature at which a liquid is delivered. Our products are quite notably temperature controlled for product safety. With only product on mark on market. We would never increase the temperature. So youre saying its not accurate. Id like to get more specific information back to the record. Beenlly, juul has supportive of regulations by your actions of been different. The spirit disregard and intent of the law. You appear to be marketing yourself as a Smoking Cessation device. However you are not fda approved for that purpose. And efforts highlight that why that is the case. Instructions, does your product come with these instructions . It does not and we would never marketed as a cessation product. Juul is not a cessation product. So you dont that is news to me and probably ever in this room that juul is not marketing yourselves as a nicotine or a Smoking Cessation product. So thats every other rating product except yours . So when someone starts on juul, would you have any problems keeping them as a customer for life . Thats what your intent is . You dont want to use it as a Smoking Cessation tool, you just want people to be addicted to nicotine for their entire lives . Absolutely not, no. 70 of the worlds one billion smokers wants to stop smoking immediately in the first and most important thing they can do to improve their Life Expectancy is move away from cigarettes. That is the stage we are at right now. Is it correct that al tria owns 35 of your company . It is true. So do you consider yourself a part of big tobacco . I consider big traditional Tobacco Company as a major investor in our company. Actions speak louder than words. Thank you. In that last segment, we heard from congresswoman Debbie Wasserman schultz about her legislation on vaping. Joining us is andrew from cq roll call. What are the major issues congress is considering regarding vaping . What are the prospects for ecigarette legislation in 2020 . There are a lot of bills in congress right now. Most of them from democrats, but a significant number of notable republicans have signed on as well. The movement in congress is about to limit access to flavors and require any company who wants to sell a flavored ecigarette product to prove the flavor is essential for the product to help an adult switch from a traditional cigarette, and also show that the product is not a risk for youth starting nicotine in the first place, which could be a difficult proposition for an ecigarette maker to prove. Because that is such a tough standard to meet, the backers of this legislation think it will effectively ban flavors from the market. Thanks. We will see a little bit more from that hearing. We will hear from congressman jim jordan, questioning one of juuls cofounders. You have a product consumers like, dont you . Certainly. If i understand the story, you and your friend were sitting around in college and said we would develop a product. We would like to try to develop a product that is much less harmful than traditional cigarettes, could be a way to get people away from smoking traditional cigarettes, and you did that, correct . Yes. You develop that product. And when you developed and started marketing a product, did you follow the law . We did, absolutely. Never broke any laws. Someone said you had 70 growth in market share over the past last couple of years. That sounds about right. You had this amazing product you developed, this tremendous market share growth and you follow the law through the entire time you had that growth rate is that right . I believe so. Followed the law, developed a product people want, that will take us away from her harmful traditional cigarettes, they can help you phase off of using nicotine altogether. And somehow you are terrible guy. This is a complex company, no doubt about it. And in large part empathetically i want to really express this. It isnt my favorite thing to be here today, but i dont mind. I dont mind because its extremely important. I very much understand the skepticism. This is an industry that has done wrong for a truly long period of time. We are changing that from the inside out with products delivered from innovative people from a company 100 committed to , changing the fabric of this market to eliminate ecigarettes eliminating cigarettes for good. We are seeing these tools actually work. We do not and i think this was stated by the chairman extremely well at the beginning we dont want any underage consumers using this product. We need to Work Together to make sure that no underage consumers use this product. It is terrible for our business, for Public Health, for our reputation. None of this is good stuff. We want to get onto the business of saving lives. Even though you follow the law there were some things that took place at the time when you had this amazing growth in market share. But you are now changing. You are no longer marketing on social media platforms, is that right . That is correct. You are placing limits on the quantity and types of things that can be sold at retail outlets. That is right. Even though you follow the law, you dont have to make those changes. For reputational concerns, you as a company decided to do those two things. Not just for that reason alone. For the safety of young people. And as an example. I stated this earlier and it will stated again. The actions we are taking we are trying to lead by example. We are trying to show we are willing to take independent protectf needed to young people from access to these products. If those standards were adopted on an industrywide basis, if we if it was required, if we could stop these counterfeit products from entering the market, if other companies that werent willing to do these things on a proactive basis were held accountable to the same standards, then we believe we would be looking at substantially lower youth usage. How many people work for juul . 3000. 3000 jobs you provide. You developed a product as an a way to have an alternative to harmful traditional cigarettes as a way to help people from hopefully stop smoking altogether. An amazing product that has a 76 growth in market share. You employed 3000 people. You made decisions you decided to change just to make sure young people dont get access to your products, like stopping marketing on social media. And limiting the quantity that can be sold to retail outlets. You have publicly said you dont think anyone should be using any Tobacco Products, including your own, until they are 21. Yet the reward is you get brought in front of congress and yelled at by democrats. I think its just an incredibly important mission. We have 3000 people now. I have never met a more Mission Oriented group of folks. We know there is a lot of stigma historically in this industry. We know it is easy to assume that we are tobacco 2. 0. We are quite the opposite. I yield back. We just heard juuls cofounder take credit from for voluntarily removing flavored ecigarettes, other than menthol, from store shelves. But the head of the American Vaping Association says flavored ecigarettes should remain on the market. Fruit and sweet flavors, fda Research Shows they are the most used products by adults saying the rhetoric despite the rhetoric saying flavors are targeting youth. Flavors were invented long before the Tobacco Industry thought ecigarettes were viable. They demanded flavors, started creating their own. Users of tobacco flavors, adult users, are more likely to still be smoking. Tobacco flavors are simply a poor imitation for what a cigarette taste like. It leads people to continue to smoke. Fruit and sweet flavors by far not just the most popular among adults but also those who have fully switched. The most Public Health benefits come from them. In september, President Trump appeared in the oval office with the health and Human Services secretary to announce plans to ban flavored ecigarettes. President trump we have a problem in our country, a problem nobody thought about too much a few years ago and its called vaping. Especially vaping as it returns to innocent children. They are coming home and they are saying mom i want to vaped. The parents dont know too much about it. Nobody knows too much about it. But they do know its causing a lot of problems. We will have to do something about it. One of the words in one of the reasons we are meeting today is to let you know it is out there. We want to have parents understand that we are studying it very carefully. It is, again, very new and potentially very bad. There have been deaths and a lot of other problems. People think it is an easy solution to cigarettes, but it turns out it has its own difficulties. Im going to ask the secretary to say a few words. And then if i could, acting and youve the fda been doing a fantastic job i want to thank you. We want to discuss the situation. It a problemnly is overall, but really specifically with respect to children. We are getting some stories that we dont want to hear. We may very well have to do something very strong about it. If i could ask you to say a few words, mr. Secretary. We briefed the president and first lady today on as yet undisclosed new data from the National Youth tobacco survey. This information shows continued surging in adolescent usage of ecigarettes. It also shows that youth are drawn to flavored ecigarettes, including mint and menthol. Currently 8 million adults use ecigarettes, but 5 million children are using ecigarettes. This is exceptionally harmful to our children. An entire generation of children risk becoming addicted to nicotine because of the attractiveness and availability of these vaping products. So with the president s support, the fda intends to finalize a guidance document that would commence enforcement to require that all flavors, other than tobacco flavor, would be removed from the market. This would include mint and menthol flavoring, as well as candy flavors, bubblegum flavor, fruit flavor, alcohol flavor you get the drift. Once the fda would finalize this guidance, we would begin Enforcement Actions to remove all such products from the marketplace. We would allow tobacco flavoring to remain, subject to their filing, the manufacturers of the ecigarette products filing for free market tobacco approval with the food and Drug Administration to assure the availability of their product is consistent with the standards Public Health standards set by the Tobacco Control act. Any other products which would be removed from the market would be able to apply under the similar regulatory pathway for approval. But have to meet that standard. I want to caution that with the president s support, while we would allow the tobacco flavored ecigarettes to be available for adults who are seeking to stop the use of combustible tobacco, if we find that children are being attracted to tobacco flavored ecigarettes, if we find manufacturers are marketing tobacco flavor ecigarettes to children, or placing them in settings where they got them we , will take enforcement action there also. Let me turn it over to the acting commissioner of the food and Drug Administration for any Additional Details and comments. The data gathered by the cdc and fda are as the secretary described. It shows an alarming trend of use by children of flavored ecigarette products. The president is directing the fda to take Decisive Action against this problem, and to finalize our plans we have been working on. This would have the effect of the secretary as the secretary mentioned of severely curtailing access to flavored ecigarette products, which we believe drive childhood use and will help us get a handle on this concerning trend. President trump commissioner has been working on this very hard, but he will double and triple up. We are looking at the very strong rules and regulations. We have laws as we need them. But we want to get to the bottom of a very unusual situation. It is so new and has become so big so fast. It could be a potential very severe problem. Commissioner, you know what to do. It is something that frankly should have been looked into a few years ago in a much more advanced way. It wasnt, and we have something that will be interesting to see what turns up. You will be able to report back in the very near future. You have done a lot of work on this. We will see what happens. Thank you very much. President trump in september said his administration would report back on rules regarding flavored ecigarette. We talked about the announcement for the administration what has happened int is addition to that announcement in early january . Have they come out with additional rules, will they come out with additional rules . There has been an evolution in the administrations thinking. At the time they said they would clear the market entirely of flavors, with no exceptions. What they did in the end was what they ended up doing in the end was making exceptions for the vape shops that are selling more adult oriented products, and for menthol flavors. They said they did this because, as they got data back from the 2019 national survey, it showed among youth, the most popular products were juul or other cartridgebased products, devices that are the main target of this new flavor policy. And that the most popular flavors were things like mint, mango, and other fruit flavors, while a small percentage of High Percentage of High Schoolers were reporting tobacco or menthol flavors as their preferred choice. That is why they decided to exempt those two flavors. There is some fear that young people will continue to use juul, just with tobacco or menthol flavors. On the other hand, fewer kids if you are kids who were starting them because of the appeal of fruit flavors or otherwise might be less interested. They wanted to preserve the menthol option, because Menthol Cigarettes are still available. They would rather steer adults toward using Vape Products rather than combustible cigarettes. In november, President Trump held a meeting with those from with representatives from the vaping industry and from Public Health groups. President trump the one thing i see though if you look at prohibition if you dont give it , to them, it will come here illegally. They are going to make it. Instead of legitimate Companies Making something safe, they will sell something on a Street Corner that will be horrible. That is the one problem i cant seem to forget. You have to look at history. Instead of having a flavor that is at least safe, they will have a flavor that is poison. That is a big problem. There are very large eCigarette Companies at this table. Most members of our trade association are Small Businesses that have built this industry from the ground up. Not from the top down. Say this is a complex problem is sophisticated plan. A flavor ban will not work. When you articulated one critical reason why it wont work. People will go to the black market. Thats because adults are demanding these flavors. President trump isnt that going to be sold illegally . Someone can open up a shop in china and ship in flavors and you dont know what standard you are getting. Isnt that a problem . You can find 15 different versions of juul mango, which has been off the market. President trump not your product, but products made illicitly. Copycats from china. What we are focused on is enforcement to get these products off the market. President trump what is it called . Counterfeit products we are not producing on the market today. President trump how bad are they . You just dont know. We have 5. 3 million kids who are addicted. Separate from lung disease. 5. 3 million kids. One million kids a day are using these products repetitively. Since the flavors have been introduced, we have seen a meteoric rise in use by kids. We have seen no increase whatsoever. Before flavors are marketed so heavily by juul. The number one flavor of ecigarettes on the market was tobacco flavor. We are not talking about removing all ecigarettes. We are talking about removing the flavors that have fueled the epidemic with kids. President trump i understand is if we take all flavors, wont they just be made illegally. It may be unsafe. What you will see last year, we saw 1. 5 million more kids become addicted. We can close that onramp. You said it correctly in september. The former commissioner has said the same thing. We can close the on ramp. As long as flavors are legal. Adultr closing it from smokers to vapor. People need flavors in order to do it. Most adults are not using flavors. They are using flavors today. Youre going to ask them to go back to using the flavor of the product that almost kills them. 92 of my revenue is flavors. Is it the largest . 70 according to the over 9000 70 according to the survey of kids get them from friends or those 18 or older. 10,000 stores. Kids are overwhelmingly able to get these by virtue of 10,000 stores. Typicallyops are adult only shops. It is very important to realize it is separate from gas and Convenience Stores. Work is typically frequent. There is a whole separate distribution chain which is a vape shop that supplied by distributor and manufacturer. One outletthe number where young people purchase that is not accurate. They should report last week that kids get their fates from social sources. 16. 5 of nine to 17yearolds get there vapes from a vape shop. It is the number one retail source. Also saide study it that these kids are refused only 25 of the time. If a vape shop we need to punish people it has a much better compliance record adult only stores. We sell a lot of age restricted products. Beer, lottery tickets, vaping products and cigarettes. It is important to our members to age restricted Product Sales properly. That is one of the reasons why our compliance rates rates are much better. President trump with or without flavor . With anything. We takeage restricted it very seriously. I think this whole debate over flavors half the audience here firmly believes flavors help adult cigarette smokers to reduce risk. Theres also a huge concern about youth being attracted to vape because of the flavors. We have to double down and do really well on age restriction. Usage is a serious problem. We felt we needed to act quickly and we removed the flavors from our business. So you think they are dangerous . When we saw the youth data, we thought the most responsible thing as a leader of the industry was to remove those flavors President Trump yet you. Think we should have flavors. Yes. I think we demonstrated through our Business Model unique to juul that we can build an adult audience of smokers without creating a new audience of abusers. Youth users. It has been illustrated through the data. The fda conducted 146,000 inspections of retail establishments. We had 29 violations. By weight of comparison juul had , 60 times more violations. They sell three times more products than us. An event 60 times president more violations. Trump why is that . Because of the way we implemented selfpolice policies. That limit youth access. No one can intellectually honestly tell you we can permanently eliminate youth access. Doingt we are focused on is getting a sciencebased argument. We will fully support the fdas process. Flavors of demonstrated playing an Important Role for an adult to make a choice to put on a cigarette and switch to a product that has less risk. We think the science is important. Thats we are focused on. We think the fda is most appropriate to determine whats appropriate. I think weve made the right decision and we are moving forward. Juul removed mango in 2018, and youth use rose. It was the number one most popular product on the market. Flavors are the issue. They are attracted to the idea. How about children . We have almost 6 million kids addicted to nicotine. They are getting addicted to nicotine because of flavors. 66 of the kids are saying they did not even know it had nicotine in it. They thought it was a candy product. Its the flavor. Its a health emergency. I salute the fact that juul said they are taking these products off the market because they care about kids. The adults have access to menthol products through juul, tobacco flavor products. Putting out cotton candy flavor and unicorn poop flavor this is kid products. We have to put the kids first. [indiscernible] not only have we called for increasing the age to 21, that is a nobrainer. That has to be done. That keeps it away from the 18yearolds. We have rolled out 21 different marketing restrictions. Banning advertising on television. Everybody criticize the industry for the marketing nobody is talking about actually putting in marketing restrictions. President trump what do you think about the senate bill . We think its a wrong approach. I think a better approach would be to raise the age to 21. Put severe restrictions on how you market the product and on top of that you have to increase penalties for retailers. Our retailers are fine with increasing penalties because they know they are instead giving these out of the hands of kids. We say three strikes and youre out. Today, the fda can allow you seven strikes before you are told to stop selling Tobacco Products. That is unacceptable. Thats perfectly ok for on top of that we are in the age of technology. This is a Technology Product helping people quit smoking. President trump in some cases. It is extremely important. [indiscernible] im a pediatrician and take care of children every day. This is a crisis. These parents and these children are counting on our help. I had a teenage boy in my office crying, saying he cant get off saying i cannot get off of it. It is a crisis. Kids sleep with their juuls under their pillows, so when they wake up in the middle of the night, they can vape. That is so addictive we really have nothing in our arsenal. We are all of the same message. We need to take all flavors off the market, pending fda investigation. Were worried we leave one flavor on the market, menthol, the children will go to that because theyre going to want something. Thats why were so desperate. President trump so theyre all legit companies, how do you solve the fact its going to be shipped in from mexico. Im looking at secretary azar and hoping he has the solution to that. President trump same problem with drugs and everything else. This is where it goes back to the children, we have five million children addicted now but what we dont want to have is another five million addicted by leaving the flavors on the market. Children like flavors, we flavor medicine, amox killen, ubblegum flavor. Children like flavored vape. These children need help quitting. We asked kids what would you do if all the flavors were taken off the market including menthol. 60 , the number one answer, was quit. Weve introduced a quit vaping program, use it on your phone, the kids text in. In january, almost no promotion, 60,000 kids have signed up for it. These kids are angry. They didnt sign up for this. They thought it was all fun and flavors until President Trump until they get ddicted. Thank you, mr. President , the American Medical Association commends the stance youve taken and you have an opportunity to save the generation from addiction. We know the youth are attracted to the flavor of cigarettes. And to those who argue e cigarettes are the task force have not found evidence they examined evidence and have not found evidence among adults these products were for Smoking Cessation. If they had the evidence they should take it to the f. D. A. Where we can the f. D. A. Can evaluate and all make stations based on science and the evidence. President trump when you say its a lesser problem than smoking cigarettes, they say the e cigarettes stop smoking and its better, you dont think so, sally . No, sir. Thank you, mr. President. Nicotine addiction is not good. It affects their attention, affects President Trump how does it compare to normal smoking of cigarettes, what youre talking about . Neither one are good. The Royal College of physicians, even your own former commissioners have stated if theyre smoking and switch it improves their health. [inaudible] kids using these products are not kids who are smokers and theyre very often not kids who would have become smokers, so the measurement of risk for these kids [inaudible] consistent with all the government studies. Thats not accurate. Its less than 1 . Most of the kids who have tried this product have already tried cigarettes or some other tobacco product. These are kids with atrisk ehavors. They dont have atrisk [inaudible] half the kids in my high school thats completely false. Half the kids in High School Re vaping. Inaudible] President Trump what do you think . The American Cancer Society is an evidence based organization like all Public Health groups in the area. President trump whats your public stance on this . Its a new modern age problem that five years ago, i guess when did this really begin . Really two years ago. It exploded. Our stance is very aligned to what you suggested on september 11. We fully support that position to take all flavored e cigarettes off of the market. President trump regardless of age. Yes, absolutely. President trump what about flavoring over 21, no . Mr. President , theres no way its an epidemic of youth use. No one disputes that in the industry. Its a matter of President Trump would they use it a lot less if they didnt have flavors . They would. President trump then we get back to the counterfeit studies. The flavors didnt exist, their entire industry would disappear and our business would be severely damaged if flavors disappeared. In 2000, 20 of americans the youth smoked cigarettes. [inaudible] i think they make an excellent product for long term smokers but they want to sit out and file applications with the f. D. A. And let the small and medium sized businesses go away with the dinosaurs and they come back with 90 of the market. All the Small Businesses cant wait. Were talking about 151,000 jobs. Over an Economic Impact analysis we put out this morning from john dunn and associates concluded that over 13,000 Small Businesses would close if you implement a flavor ban. President trump a flavor ban . Correct and they would eliminate 151,000 thats not right. Im sorry, thats just not right. Im an accountant. Thats terrific. I looked at data and they say there are approximate 10,000 vaping shops. Youve got 10,000 shops, four employees per, four fulltime employees per, thats 4,000 employees. Hold on. The Convenience Stores sell a lot of products and wont go out of business because they dont have flavors. Its the vaping shops. May i finish, please . So theyre not going to all go out of business because they cant sell flavors. Some may. That would be unfortunate and some may. If there are 50,000 employees full time equivalent in vaping shops, you have 5. 5 million kid. Youre talking about a hundred kids addicted per one employee, typically minimum wage. I put the kids first. Its over a hundred kids per fulltime equivalent employee. These are the shops. This is the sector of the industry thats grown up to compete with Cigarette Companies. You have a new industry competing for the first time for the cigarette smoker. Trying to yank them off of that cigarette. So we have to do both things. Theres no reason we cant do both things in this country. If you eliminate flavors, according to this report, because flavors make up about 85 to 90 of their sales, they will go out of business. Theres no question about that because no Small Business owner could take that kind of hit to their revenue. President trump how does juul feel about that. Basically youre saying juul why is juul not going out of business if they dont do flavors. Theyre the big guys. They can wait it out, a year or two years going back to the market share they have today. President trump whats the game . The science based evidence argument we look forward to making we are preserving this opportunity for adult smokers who cant quit to have an option. Its really important work. Thats the mission of our company. Hes right. This youth issue we felt and were a part of it, we had to address it as a leader and took the tough steps. President trump you think flavors are very dangerous in terms of addiction and other things . I think flavors can play a role for adults making a transition. The thing is the kids get access to the flavors. President trump we take them out of it, who will take your place . Counterfeiters . And they are dangerous. Right . Mr. President , first of all, weve not seen it grown in adults using these products with the introduction of flavors. Theres a lot of myths going on here. [inaudible] let me finish. I did not interrupt you. A little different. What you will have is you will have companies who produce products that have tobacco flavor that used to be the most popular and may still be among adults, though not among kid. Then second, what were talking about here and what your proposal was is for companies that then have data to show they have a product with or without a flavor that actually promotes cessation and doesnt appeal to kid can go to the food and Drug Administration for the review. Were not talking about a permanent ban. What were talking about is making them develop the science, produce it to the agency that has the authority to review it and then have a science based decision made about whats in the Public Interest and thats what were really talking about. What do you do in the interim . If we do nothing in the interim, were going to wake up six months from now and another million and a half kids are going to be addicted and they wont be able to quit. President trump let me ask you this, the concept of letting states make their own decision, we talked about that the other day, what about that . A state. We put a 21 limit, not everyone is great on that. You agree on 21 . You put a age limit, 21. What about the concept of every state decides . I think nationwide we need protection for our kids wherever they live and it shouldnt be if you live in a state that doesnt address this issue your children are at risk. Thats what worries me about this. President trump then theyll go buy it and go back. Thats why the f. D. A. Has this authority. We have a Governmental Agency that has the authority to address the complicated questions that exist and put in place rules that masaience based decisions. Every company in the country including small vape shops, large companies, juul have to do it by may this year anyway and the f. D. A. Is under a statute obligation to provide an answer within six months. So what were really weighing is this near Term Solution thats being proposed and i value what matt says. I have children. I wouldnt want them using these products. But were valuing a 610 month solution where the f. D. A. Has to make the decision by december of next year anyway versus 100,000 jobs. He way, for the record go ahead, please. Mr. President , i would like to say its been an important conversation about jobs but im here because our group represents millions of families, of moms all across this country and dads across this country and grandparents. You can go to any state in this country and ask people with children, this is what people are worried about. President trump what do you like about this solution . I will tell you this is a generation of children that would otherwise not have been initiated into tobacco use and we know that because the youth use figures were at the lowest theyve ever been before juul came on the market with their patented nicotine technology with huge amounts of nicotine going to the brain so quickly. Thats why the kid talk about the head rush. This addiction is severe addiction. Its enormous amounts of nicotine, so much more than a combustible cigarette and parents are terrified. We hear it every day from people all across the country, all walks of life, in cities, in suburbs, in the country. And they feel like theyve lost their kids. Straight a students are flunking out of school. Athletes, star athletes cant run a mile. And what i hear over and over, what we hear all the time is i dont recognize my child. The bouts of anger, parents are in pain and we need you. President trump whats your solution . Our solution is your solution. President trump just ban it, right . No, no. President trump if you have the real solution just ban it, right . No, thats not correct. President trump what is your solution. My solution is what you have the right indistinct for in the beginning, the flavors hooked the kids. Take the flavors. Leave tobacco for assaults. Your original instippingt and suggestion was right. Were not prohibitionists, leave tobacco flavor for adults because in the end, its not there yet but if the science ultimately proves that yes, this is going to help people quit, then they should have that right. We have no interest in telling adults what to do. I dont think the science is there yet. We need more data. Lets clarify for everyone the benefits. Lots of statements have been made about e cigarettes and those that Harm Reduction devices. Theres been no evidence submitted to the f. D. A. About that fact. Any manufacturer who makes that claim will be enforced against. You may think theres that evidence. That evidence that exactly is the process of Tobacco Control act requires is bringing forth that evidence in the context of the preauthorization. That would be part of the process. President trump what do you think . Mr. President , its a little hard to take all the virtue signaling going around. You have to remember the history of this. We all were excited there was an opportunity by the way, i came from applachia, from bluecollar world. My brother is a smoker. I understand. Its a very addictive behavior. And it was exciting in the beginning to think oh, look, theres an opportunity for people to get off tobacco. And at that point when it came to kids, the people who were buying their product were aging out. They didnt have a generation coming up behind them until they came up with ecigs and the truth is they targeted kids. They paid influencers on social media to make it look cool and suddenly we had a youth problem again. By the way, many of these same people are in cahoots with the Marijuana Industry and the Tobacco Industry. So we get money from nobody. We just care about the kid. I like your original solution. I think we ban all flavors and take it to 21 and ban advertisers. And can you say what you said. Your point earlier was correct. Theres always, when you make something legal theres always the black market. We can say that about anything. We can say that about heroin. We can make it legal. We can say that about opiods, we can sell it for those who want it. I dont know if that works. President trump thank you. Go ahead. Mr. President , from the American Lung association, and i certainly want to echo our Public Health partners but on a daytoday basis, the number one concern we hear from our communities from parents, from schools is that how do we really address this epidemic that were facing . So all of us are looking to you, your leadership role in terms of really helping to create the next generation thats going to be free from addiction. President trump whats your recommended solution . To ban all flavors, including menthol. President trump including menthol . Mints and menthol. President trump thats a big statement. Thats a very big statement. The American Cancer Society absolutely agrees with that. Its certainly an important step, mr. President. But its one that you are tting out in september these groups have 160 million reasons for Michael Bloomberg not to come to the table and compromise. 1630 million. These are volunteer parents around the country. These are parent advocates, volunteers because parents are in pain. I sat at the table with 13 families from massachusetts, everyones story was individual to them but also the same. People who said their kids were no longer recognizable. Their kids couldnt focus in school. Their kids were having trouble breathing. Their kids were angry. This is not a small thing. This kind of nicotine addiction at these levels, people are in pain. Parents across this country, all parents care. And we know you care. President trump you want to ban all flavors . Ban all flavors. President trump including menthol. We said earlier if you get rid of just the mint, the kids will go to menthol. The kids are addicted. Only now when kids are frightened they understand they are not in control. To the point about the predator behavior, the reason that we started our group is because our sons came home from school one day in 2018 and said there was a mixed message presentation about juuling and that in their school with no other adults in the room, someone who came from an outside antiaddiction group but in the end turned out to have been a juul representative told the kids that juuling was not for kids but was totally safe and it would receive f. D. A. Approval any moment and both those statements were and remain untrue and why a group of moms started doing their own research and understood that this was an epidemic of enormous proportion and as you said earlier, that the kids were targeted. This is not about risk taking kids, this affects all families, there are five million kids doing it, that means there are millions of families in pain and they need you to save our generation of kid. President trump how many will do it if you get rid of the flavors, how many children will still do it, lets say you dont have flavors. Now you have five million. How many children are doing it . 97 of kids who are vaping re using flavored vapes. President trump you agree with that . Youth numbers certainly agree kids are getting access from flavors. 97 . President trump will they put their own flavors in . Are they going to inject it with flavor, will they put their own flavors in . Our product is a single use. President trump they cant do it . A hundred of the deaths resulted in counterfeit products. Thats a different issue. I think its worth pointing out. Its a different issue. President trump its an important issue, though. In other words, because ive been reading about a lot of deaths and the death really is from counterfeit, its not from jewel . Its not using marijuana. President trump kids are using other things . Its cannabis product, not nicotine product. Our look at vaping and e cigarettes continues, joining us is andrew from c. Q. Roll call. The president went to a evolution in his thinking and particularly underage thinking, how did his thinking evolve . So the president after announcing what sounded like a widespread flavor ban, he eventually seemed moved by some concerns raised by conserve pitch groups and Small Businesses in the vaping industry about both economic and political impact of such a move. A lot of the vaping industry is pretty large corporations but theres a sizable segment of Small Businesses that produce nicotine liquids and there are thousands of jobs that potentially could have been at stake if a full throated flavor ban went into effect. Conservative groups are emphasizing the number of adults who vape in some of the states trump won in 2016 like michigan, wisconsin, pennsylvania, the number of vapers in those states exceed the margin of his victory there. And they were making the argument that if trump banned flavors, he could potentially lose those voters. And indeed in the days leading up to the january policy announcement while trump was at his florida resort, maralago, there were apparently protesters with shirts and signs saying we vape, we vote lined up along his motorcade route. In that November White house meeting we did hear talk about, however, banning the use of vaping products, ecigarettes to those 21 and above, the administration talking about that, where does that stand . The purchasing age for Tobacco Products including e cigarettes is 21 nationwide. When President Trump signs the spending bill into law the end of 2019, that became the law of the land. The f. D. A. Is still probably going to be taking a few months before its fully enforced around the country. In the meantime a lot of states already have the age 21 in place and states that dont might be a little slower to enforce it but for now, you know, it is illegal for retailers to sell to anyone under 21 and they need to be checking the i. D. s of anyone who looks under 30. Not long after that November White house meeting, the head of the f. D. A. Center for Tobacco Products testified before congress, he was asked about whether the f. D. A. Plans to ban flavored cigarettes. Youre aware that on september 11, h. H. S. Secretary azar said the f. D. A. Would issue guidance clearing the market of, quote, nontobacco flavored e cigarettes including mint and menthol products, right . Yes. And youre aware secretary aye czar announced the ban because the numbers from a. T. S. Showed distributing rides in the youth of e cigarette use especially through the use of nontobacco flavors that appeal to kids, correct . Correct. And the commissioner stated more than a quarter of High School Students were current e cigarette users in 2019 and the overwhelming majority of youth e cigarettes users, i think you said 75 of High Schoolers but the overwhelming majority of e get users cited the use of popular fruit and menthol and mint flavors, correct . Thats correct. The purpose of banning, or as secretary azar said, clearing the market of flavored e cigarettes was to decrease youth vaping, right . That would be consistent with what the secretary said, yes. There was urgency to this issue, there was urgency and why the president said september 11 f. D. A. Guide ants would come in, quote, a couple of weeks, right . Thats what was said. And there was an urgency that was felt at that time, right . Thats correct. And on october 25 you stated the f. D. A. s work on the flavor guidance issue was, quote, a very, very, very high priority and were trying to complete work on it as quickly a as possible, right . I dont remember the date, but yes, i said that. You said that on october 25 to the hill. But the guidance, this flavor guidance has not yet been published, has it . No. According to a letter sent the by f. D. I. And oira, f. D. A. Drafted divideance and ensent it to oira, an office within o. M. B. , october 25, correct . Yes, sir. To be clear the f. D. A. s guidance document followed through on secretary azars september 11 announcement the f. D. A. Would clear the market of all nontobacco flavors, right . Im not going to get into the substance of the document that was submitted. Ok. On what basis are you not getting into the substance . Because there has been no final decision made on this policy because there are ongoing discussions taking place, im not going to be able to get into the substance of that was in that document. Who inrestricted you not to get into the substance of it . Based on discussions internally at the agency and Standard Practice when theres ongoing policymaking that we dont talk publicly about what is under consideration. Id be happy, as i said in my remarks to come back and brief you and the staff when there is a final decision and walk you through everything but it remains an open, ongoing set of discussions. According to the f. D. A. s letter sent to me yesterday, oira concluded its review on noove 4, right . Correct. Now, did oira make any changes to the initial guidance submitted by the f. D. A. . Again, i cant go into the details of what we mains ongoing discussions. Now youre familiar with something called executive order 12866, right . Yes, sir. According to this catchy phrase, e. O. 12866, the f. D. A. Is not allowed to publish in the federal register until oira has essentially completed its rerue, right . For things subject to the executive order. Correct. And this is one of them. This was a policy that because of its significance we sent to o. M. B. For review, yes. Eo81266 would apply and basically talks about the types of policies that would be submitted to oira and sent back to f. D. A. , correct . Correct. Oira marked the review, quote, unquote, completed on its website and that means, mr. Zoeller the policy is now back with the f. D. A. , right . They completed their review on november 4 and sent the document back to us but there were still other ongoing policyrelated discussions going on in parallel but oira completed its review as you stated and sent it back to us november 4. When you say there are policy discussions ongoing between who and who . There were parallel policy discussions going on between f. D. A. And the department and the white house. So according to executive order 12866, the f. D. A. Is not allowed to publish in the federal register until oira has completed its review and now they have completed its review, the f. D. A. Can publish the guidance, right . If the complete executive branch review of the policy was done but there were still, as i said, in parallel other ongoing policy related discussions going on in addition to the oira review of the guidance document we sent. These parallel discussions, this sounds like some kind of irregular channel of of the ns independent standard submission of the guidance from f. D. A. To oira and back from oira to f. D. A. . Is there some other review that is happening right now that has nothing to do with oira or f. D. A. . There are ongoing policy related discussions between the agency, the department and the white house about what the policy should be. Ok. So did oira really complete its review if theyre still discussing with you this document . Oira completed its review but at other levels within the department and the white house and the agency again in parallel there were discussions continuing about what the policy should be even though oira had completed its review. Who is a part of those discussions at the f. D. A. . That would be the leadership of the agency, the leadership of the department and various parts of the white house. That leadership includes you . Ive been involved i would say peripherally in those discussions, its mostly been the leadership of the agency. And at the white house who has the leadership involved . I think its various offices from the Domestic Policy Council to office of management and budget and others. Ive not been directly involved in discussions with the white house. You would agree with me, sir and the White House Policy Council is headed by joe rogen, right . Correct. You would agree with me the f. D. A. Should be regulating Tobacco Products, dont you . Thats our job, yes. Its not a waste of time, right . Its one of the most important Public Health things a Regulatory Agency can do. Its something i have devoted the last 25 years of my life to. Thats why im so concerned by your prior answer that the White House Domestic Council headed by joe rogen is part of these discussions when mr. Rogen said it was, quote, a huge waste of time, close quote, for f. D. A. To regulate tobacco. Last week my home state of massachusetts became the first in the nation to place a permanent ban on flavored e cigarette and menthol cigarette products. This is important because if we are banning flavors, we must ban all flavors which includes mint and menthol. To not do so would be discriminatory since menthol in particular posed a unique and deadly burden on the black community. We must clamp down on the production of menthol products and not the individual possession of it because there are real intergenerational traumatic consequences of broken windows policing that has advertise torically overcriminalized black and brown communities, something i called for in my peoples justice guarantee resolution, we must simultaneously be atune to Public Health and safety to ensure there are no more eric garners. For years big Tobacco Companies disproportionately targeted more tobacco ads and specifically more Menthol Tobacco ads in black neighborhoods. In some instances as many as 10 times more ads for menthol products. The c. D. C. Reports nearly 910 black smokers prefer Menthol Cigarettes. I think its safe to say, mr. Zoeller, the targeting was effective, correct . I would agree with that. Today nearly 35 of black menthol smokers say they would quit smoking if Menthol Cigarettes were banned and almost 2 3 of black smokers under 24 years of age would do the same. A year ago the f. D. A. Announced plans to ban Menthol Cigarettes saying a ban was necessary because menthol products, quote, unquote, disproportionately adversely affect underserved communities. A year has passed and the f. D. A. Has not followed through on this ban. Why is that, mr. Zoeller . As you said, congresswoman, we went through an advanced notice of proposed rule making on a variety of issues related to flavors including the presence of a menthol in cigarettes. And i would add to what you said, that one of the Public Health concerns about men though lated cigarettes is not st this proportionate use of cigarettes by africanamericans but the role Menthol Cigarettes plays in attracting kids of any color to experimenting with cigarettes. And we continue to review the comments and explore what the regulatory options and policies should be but i absolutely hear from d share your concern a Public Health perspective. I claim my time in the interest of time, just to be clear on the record does the f. D. A. Plan to follow through with this ban, yes or no . I cannot give you a yes or no answer in a open and public hearing. All i can tell you is were continuing to review all the evidence related to flavors and all Tobacco Products as we try to follow the regulatory science and come up with the right policy. So previous attempts to ban menthol have been overridden by the office of management and budget, why is that . You need to be more specific. I dont know what youre referring to. Do you want me to restate the question . R i dont understand what specific instance youre referring to. Ill move on. I think the point im reiterating and cant underscore enough because were talking about a life and death matter is that 467,000 black people die every year from 47,000 black people die because of smoking related illness making it the largest preventable death than young black americans even nor than gun accidents and car accidents. We dont have more time. People are dying. So in my final second i just want to go to a different line or a moment. So e cigarettes are not are ecigarettes recognized as a Smoking Cessation aide or not . Theyre not approved, not. Menthol e cigarettes are not an off ramp for adult menthol smokers, they are an on ramp for hooking a new generation of smokers . Well, if we can go past the 20 seconds you have left, theres a Public Health balancing act the agency has to do with whatever policy emerges on flavors and its balancing are flavors helping adults successfully transition off cigarettes completely to e cigarettes, what role are flavors playing in that . And its part of the balancing that we need to do. Its an easy call on the negative side of the ledger when it comes to the role flavors of playing in attracting kids to experiment especially kid Walking Around thinking theyre Harmless Products but its a balancing act because weve heard repeatedly from former smokers it was the presence of certain flavors that helped them successfully transition completely away from cigarettes. The f. D. A. Official we just saw could not say if flavored e cigarettes would be banned. The administration has since made that decision. What exactly again has been banned and what isnt, Andrew Siddons . You no longer will be able to buy fruit flavored cartridges or pods for e cigarette brands like juul. The only flavors youll get for those products are tobacco and menthol. If you use a refillable tank you can buy liquids for at vape shops you will be able to continue to buy flavors as long as the flavors theyre selling arent explicitly targeted towards children. We heard from Frank Pallone after the announcement of e cigarettes, the chair of the energy and commerce committee, opposing some of the move by the administration. What might we hear from congress in 2020 . One of the next steps well see from the administration itself is how strongly it enforces a may deadline for e cigarette manufacturers to submit applications for sales authorization to the f. D. A. This is something required under the 2009 Tobacco Control act. And for the first time a decade later, the e cigarette manufacturers are finally going to have to submit these applications to the f. D. A. To show things about their products safety and data about whether it helps adults quit and how risky it is for establishing new nicotine users. And so starting in may, the f. D. A. Will be considering those applications and a major question will southbound how much will the Trump Administration weigh the risks of youth use against the potential benefits in helping adult smokers quit using traditional cigarettes. Congress is concerned the continuation of having any flavors on the market will mean young people will continue to be attracted to e cigarettes. While the prospects of Congress Getting anything enacted into law now beyond the tobacco 21 law seem unlikely in this session but the house is likely to take up and probably pass bills that will put more restrictions on what the f. D. A. Would they would put more restrictions on how the f. D. A. Considers the risks and benefits of permitting a flavor to be on sale. Joining us on our program of underaged vaping and flavored e sioddons, s andrew at cq. Com and on twitter at asiddons. And well close out our program with another look at President Trumps remarks on new years eve. President trump the vaping is coming out and well be announcing it very shortly. Some people already know about what were doing. We have to product our families. At the same time its a big industry and we want to product the industry. Well be taking off the flavors for certain times, certain flavors. Were going to protect our family and children and the industry and hopefully if everything is safe theyll be going back on the market. The flavors will come off and be checked, people have died from vaping. We think we understand why but were doing a very exhaustive examination and hopefully everything will be back on the market very, very shortly. Look, vaping can be good from the standpoint, if you look at e cigarettes you stop smoking if you can stop smoking thats a big advantage. We think well get it back on to the market very, very quickly but we have to protect the children. We have to protect the families, at the same time we a very big industry and well take care of the industry. Cspans washington journal live every day with news and policy issues that impact you. Coming up this morning, well preview the week ahead in washington with National Journal Senate Reporter zac cohen and Politico White House reporter gabby orr and talk about retaliation defenses. And also a discussion of the afghanistan papers with Washington Post Investigative Reporter craig whitlock. Watch cspans washington journal live at 7 00 eastern this morning. Join the discussion. 2020 democratic President Joe Biden hosted a Community Town hall in denton, iowa and talked about expanding obamacare and making Climate Change a priority and investing in education and the work force. This is an hour and 20 minutes