Democrats introduce bill to ‘protect children’ from electronic cigarettes

Senate Democrats introduced legislation on Wednesday that would ban marketing electronic cigarettes to teens.

Despite their admission that the health implications of electronic cigarettes “are not yet clear,” Senators Barbara Boxer (D., Calif.), Dick Durbin (D., Ill.), Tom Harkin (D., Iowa), Richard Blumenthal (D., Conn.), and Edward Markey (D., Mass.) introduced the bill to “protect children” from the smoking simulators.

The “Protecting Children from Electronic Cigarette Advertising Act” would authorize the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) to “determine what constitutes marketing e-cigarettes to children, and would allow the FTC to work with states attorneys general to enforce the ban.”

“We cannot risk undoing decades of progress in reducing youth smoking by allowing e-cigarette makers to target our kids,” Boxer said in a statement. “This bill will help protect our children from an industry that profits from addiction.”

In a statement, Durbin decried “fruit and candy flavors and glossy celebrity ads,” while Harkin said electronic cigarettes advertising is “‘Joe Camel’ all over again.”

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