This has been a pretty rough month for the prospects of vaping going forward as the United States enters the election season. One thing the politicians and executive branch can agree on is vaping is a scourge plaguing the youth of the nation and urgent action is a priority.

Former FDA Commissioner Scott Gottlieb exits the stage calling for further actions such as flavor bans to end the "epidemic" of youth vaping, a turn of phrase often repeated to demonize vaping as specifically targeting teenagers. Former Commissioner Gottlieb has floated the idea of both flavor and product bans in the past.

The White House introduced its 2020 budget which called for huge user fees of up to $100 million per year to be extracted from the vape industry to fund FDA initiatives. User fees are typically passed on to consumers by way of higher prices, in this case effecting prices of all e-cigarette products but mainly vape juice and AIO type vape devices like the JUUL.

The idea of user fees to combat youth vaping has been previously proposed by Democrat Senator Jeane Shaheen in legislation, prompting the Senator to say in a statement "I’m glad the Trump administration is weighing-in and making it clear that it’s past time to tackle the crisis of youth e-cigarette use ... I hope to work with the administration as I rally bipartisan support for my legislation in Congress."

This week, two Democrat members of congress introduced legislation which would destroy the vape industry called the Reversing the Youth Tobacco Epidemic Act.