In December of 2019, Mitch Zeller, who at the time ran the FDA’s Center for Tobacco Products, got an urgent phone call from a fellow staffer at the agency.
A few months earlier, President Donald Trump and his administration had vowed to take e-cigarettes in every flavor except tobacco off the market to quash a youth vaping epidemic that, at the time, saw almost 30 percent of American teens using nicotine.
By the time Zeller received that December call, he says, the White House had different instructions for the FDA: Limit the ban to pod-based vapes, like Juuls, and leave menthol flavors alone.
Zeller says this softer touch “absolutely” came about because Trump, heading into the 2020 election year, got spooked by pushback to his original plans. “The White House,” Zeller says, “went into political retreat.”
Almost seven years later and well into his second term, Trump is vice-signaling even more aggressively to the pro-vape crowd and the industry that supplies it. The payoff is unclear, given that vapers make up a relatively small chunk of the voting public, and a vast illicit market is already there to serve virtually anyone jonesing for a flavored e-cigarette—but that hasn’t stopped Trump’s FDA from making things official.
Earlier this month, reportedly under pressure from Trump, the agency authorized the sale of blueberry- and mango-flavored vape juices made by the company Glas, the first time the agency has given its stamp of approval to e-cigarette flavors other than tobacco and menthol. “Our data show that flavored products can play an important role in helping adult smokers move away from combustible cigarettes, while our technology is designed to help limit youth access and support responsible use,” a Glas spokesperson tells WIRED.
Still, according to The New York Times, that decision was the final straw for recently departed FDA commissioner Marty Makary, who was concerned about the products’ appeal to kids.
Zeller, who retired from the FDA in 2022, says he doesn’t have a front-row seat to Trump’s thinking these days. But, he says, the push for flavored vapes “is consistent with everything that I have seen the president say publicly about how important the vaping constituency is to him politically,” as well as with his apparently cozy relationship with tobacco industry executives.
In a statement, White House spokesman Kush Desai tells WIRED, “President Trump consistently pledged to expand access to vapes in light of an abundance of recent evidence finding that these products are beneficial for Americans trying to quit smoking. The only guiding factor behind the Trump administration’s health policymaking is Gold Standard Science.” Desai did not respond to questions about Trump’s desire to appeal to vapers; he also referred questions about Zeller’s recollection of events to the FDA, which did not respond.
There are indeed studies that suggest flavored vapes are appealing to adults as well as kids, perhaps helping some make the transition from cigarettes to the probably-less-deadly electronic version. But Trump—a man who, in the lead up to the 2024 election, promised to “save vaping” and whose administration has been similarly friendly to other vice-adjacent industries, including psychedelics and prediction markets—has seemingly been influenced by public opinion on this issue before.
His original flavor ban plans gave rise to the “we vape, we vote” movement, a motley group of adult vapers and vape shop owners from across the country, including key swing states, angry about Trump’s planned crackdown.