GRAND RAPIDS, MI – A Grand Rapids-based e-liquid manufacturer has sued to prevent the state’s ban on flavored vapor products from taking effect.

Grand Rapids-based Mister E-Liquid, an online wholesaler with five retail stores in Michigan, said the emergency ban by Gov. Gretchen Whitmer will force the company to lay off workers, leave the state and potentially lose $500,000 in inventory.

The company filed a federal lawsuit and motions for a temporary restraining order and a preliminary injunction to prevent the Wednesday, Oct. 2, ban on flavored nicotine vaping products from taking effect

No hearings have been set.

The lawsuit was filed against Whitmer and Robert Gordon, the state Department of Health and Human Services director.

A similar lawsuit was filed in Houghton County Circuit Court by Mark Slis and his Houghton-based company, 906 Vapor. He argued that the state does not have authority under emergency rules to ban flavored nicotine vaping products.

In a Monday, Sept. 30, statement, state Attorney General Dana Nessel’s Office said: “We continue to review the lawsuit with our clients and will be making a determination as to next steps in tandem with them.”

Under the rule, businesses will have to stop selling flavored vaping products, not use imagery representing flavors to sell the products and follow restrictions on how close vaping advertisements can be to a point of sale or food.

The company’s website said: “We have taken the website down for maintenance to do work required to comply with the State of Michigan vapor product flavor ban. In the meantime, if you would like to place an order for any of our Michigan compliant products, please click the link to proceed to www.Mister-Es.com, our State of Michigan flavor ban compliant site.”

Whitmer contends that flavored vapes appeal to children.

Dr. Joneigh Khaldun, chief medical executive and chief deputy director for health at MDHHS, said earlier: “Youth vaping is a public health emergency and has been declared an epidemic by the U.S. surgeon general. Nicotine in e-cigarettes is harmful to developing brains and has dangerous long-term health consequences such as heart disease and cancer.”

Mister E-Liquid and others say e-cigarettes are intended for use by adults who want to quit smoking. They contend that vaping is far safer than smoking and has helped lower the number of smokers across the country.

“Flavors are crucial to helping adult smokers make the switch and stay away from cigarettes,” Mister E-Liquid’s attorneys, Kevin Blair of Lansing, and Eric Gotting and Azim Chowdhury of Washington, D.C., wrote in the lawsuit.

“Vapor products were in fact invented by smokers for smokers looking for less harmful products that do not smell or taste like traditional cigarettes. Adult vapors overwhelmingly report that non-tobacco flavors and flavor variability matter to them and help keep them off tobacco.”

The attorneys say vaping-related illnesses reported across the U.S. are mostly tied to after-market additives being used with THC, the active ingredient in marijuana.

“In most cases of reported illness, authorities have found vitamin E acetate from cannabis samples in patients’ lungs. This rogue oil might not completely transform into vapor, and instead travels into the lungs, causing harm.”

Mister E-Liquid has 75 workers. It sells products around the world. Of its 3,000 monthly online orders, 70 percent originate outside of Michigan.

The company also has retail stores in Belmont, Grand Rapids, Kentwood, Niles and Okemos, and two in Illinois. It has shut down its website for wholesale orders and expects to shut down sales to consumers, too.

“With the manufacture of flavored vape as the backbone of the company, Mr. E-Liquid simply cannot survive in Michigan without being able to manufacture flavored nicotine products.”

Mister E-Liquid contends that preventing sales of flavored nicotine products outside of Michigan is unconstitutional and intrudes on authority of federal regulators.

In seeking a temporary injunction to prevent the rules taking effect, the company’s attorney cited the likelihood Mister E-Liquid would prevail at trial, and its “immediate, irreparable harm” if the law takes effect.

The harm to the company will far outweigh any harm to the state and the “public interest will be served if Defendants are compelled to maintain the status quo," it said.