CAA, PCA Ask OMB to Stop FDA’s Proposed Flavored Cigar Ban

Two cigar trade organizations have requested that the White House Office of Management and Budget (OMB) stop the U.S. Food & Drug Administration’s (FDA) proposed ban on flavored cigars.

Earlier this week, representatives from the Cigar Association of America (CAA) and Premium Cigar Association (PCA) met with OMB and asked the White House office to halt FDA’s upcoming ban on flavored cigars. Last month, FDA submitted its finalized rules that would ban flavored cigars and menthol cigarettes—these are two separate rules—to OMB, which is currently reviewing the proposals to determine if FDA followed federal rules, including evaluating the economic impacts of the proposed regulations. Once OMB finishes its review, FDA will be able to announce and enact the new regulations.

While the overall message from the two trade groups was similar—don’t let FDA do this—the two groups had different talking points.

For example, CAA focused on how economically impactful this would be for the cigar industry—previously the group estimated it would cost approximately $4 billion in sales and 16,000 jobs—while PCA made that case flavored cigars are a small industry.

CAA cited data from the 2022 and 2023 National Youth Tobacco Surveys that showed that just .83 percent of youth surveyed indicated they had used a flavored cigar in the last 30 days, a number that could be even lower for 2023.

“FDA’s Flavored Cigar Product Standard fails on all three accounts,” said David Ozgo, president of CAA, in a press release. “Youth usage rates of cigars, and of flavored cigars in particular, are at all-time lows and these low rates reflect a stable and sustained trend.”

PCA mentioned that FDA still hasn’t finalized the federal Tobacco 21 standard, the law that would require people to be at least 21-years-old to purchase tobacco products. For context, President Trump signed the law in late 2019 and FDA was supposed to have finalized it by mid-2020.

Both groups mentioned that FDA needs to do more economic impact analysis, specifically mentioning concerns about how a ban on flavored cigars would affect minority communities.

There was also a broader discussion about FDA’s authority. CAA mentioned that FDA recently lost a lawsuit regarding premium cigar regulations due to a lack of scientific evidence, something the group says is happening again here. The PCA questioned whether Congress gave FDA the authority to ban product categories under its product standards rules.

“It’s questionable whether FDA has the authority to issue standards that result in a product ban, especially when they are acknowledging that the regulation does not address a specific risk,” said Scott Regina, president of PCA and owner of Emerson’s Cigars, in a press release.

While it’s unclear how persuasive OMB will be to these arguments at this stage of the process, they are all previews of arguments that are likely to come up in future lawsuits.

It’s still unknown when OMB will complete its review process and when the rules will fomrally be announced. The proposed ban is expected to cover all types of flavored cigars including larger flavored cigars like ACID, Java, Tatiana and others.

FDA has said that there will be a one-year compliance period before the agency takes action by punishing those selling the two types of products, i.e. flavored cigars and menthol cigarettes will be sold for at least one year after the finalized rules “go into effect.” The tobacco industry is likely to sue FDA and will likely ask a court(s) for an injunction until after those lawsuits are resolved, further delaying the enforcement.

Coincidentally, earlier today, the Biden administration announced new final guidance for regulatory analysis.

Charlie Minato

I am an editor and co-founder of halfwheel.com/Rueda Media, LLC. I previously co-founded and published TheCigarFeed, one of the two predecessors of halfwheel. I have written about the cigar industry for more than a decade, covering everything from product launches to regulation to M&A. In addition, I handle a lot of the behind-the-scenes stuff here at halfwheel. I enjoy playing tennis, watching boxing, falling asleep to the Le Mans 24, wearing sweatshirts year-round and eating gyros. echte liebe.