The Trump administration wants to ban menthol cigarettes, but NC senators push back
WASHINGTON -- The Trump administration wants to ban menthol cigarettes, citing their popularity with underage smokers. But North Carolina’s two Republican senators, typically fans of the administration but representing the biggest tobacco-growing state in the country, are fighting back against the proposed ban.
The Food and Drug Administration last week announced its plans to ban menthol cigarettes and cigars and to limit flavors available for vaping or electronic cigarettes. The proposal came a week after the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention announced that a record-low 14 percent of American adults smoke cigarettes.
The FDA, in its announcement, said 54 percent of young smokers (ages 12-17) use menthol cigarettes and 70 percent of African-American youth smokers use them. Less than one-third of smokers 35 and older use menthol cigarettes. Menthol cigarettes made up 35 percent of the U.S. cigarette market in 2016, according to the Truth Initiative, an anti-smoking group.
“These menthol-flavored products represent one of the most common and pernicious routes by which kids initiate on combustible cigarettes. The menthol serves to mask some of the unattractive features of smoking that might otherwise discourage a child from smoking. Moreover, I believe that menthol products disproportionately and adversely affect underserved communities,” wrote FDA commissioner Scott Gottlieb, who was appointed by President Donald Trump and confirmed by the Senate.
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