Posted on 09/22/2019 3:33:35 PM PDT by MarvinStinson
Conservative leaders are circulating data to White House staff that claims adults who vape will turn on President Trump if he follows through with his planned ban on flavored e-cigarettes, Axios has learned.
Between the lines: The data (shown below) reveals that the number of adult vapers in key battleground states greatly outweighs the margins by which Trump won those states in 2016 — and they argue it could cost him reelection.
What we're hearing: "While parents may be concerned about e-cigarettes, the people who genuinely care about vaping as a voting issue so far outweighs the number of people Trump needs to win in 2020 that they are royally screwing themselves by doing this," Paul Blair, the director of strategic initiatives at Americans for Tax Reform, tells me.
Suburban moms concerned about vaping "don't have the same voter intensity on this as adult vapers do," an industry lobbyist said. Florida, which Trump won by 113,000 voters, had about 873,000 adult vapers in 2016. They reason that if 1 in 8 vapers turn against Trump in 2020 because he foreclosed their vaping options, it could jeopardize the election. Why it matters: If the FDA backs away from Trump's proposed enforcement policy, it would be the second time in recent weeks that political concerns prompted him to dial back government regulations.
Trump's openness this summer to expanded background checks cooled after the gun lobby and campaign advisers warned about bad internal polling. Our thought bubble: There are four unsubstantiated assumptions about adult vapers in the case being presented to Trump:
They start out as Trump voters. They wouldn't vape anymore if they couldn't get the flavors. They are single-issue voters around vaping rights. The eventual Democratic nominee would be more vape-friendly. Still, the math can't be totally ignored, especially in places like Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin where Trump's 2016 win margins were so narrow and the number of adult vapers is relatively high.
By the numbers: More than 4 million people in swing states regularly used e-cigarettes in 2016, according to FDA-funded survey data published last year in the Annals of Internal Medicine.
Industry experts say that number has increased significantly in recent years.
Data: Mirboulouk, et. al, 2016, "Prevalence and Distribution of E-Cigarette Use Among U.S. Adults: Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System, 2016", Census Bureau, Atlas of U.S. Presidential Elections; Chart: Andrew Witherspoon/Axios Behind the scenes: The White House scheduled a listening session with conservative groups last Thursday after receiving intense backlash from GOP leaders and industry execs following the announcement of the ban.
Among the invitees: The Competitive Enterprise Institute, the Goldwater Institute, AFT and the Vapor Technology Association. But roughly 24 hours after invitations went out, the meeting was canceled. "They’re in chaos mode on this stuff because the backlash has been so resoundingly overpowering," one invitee said. A White House official says the meeting is expected to be rescheduled. The bottom line: The political pressure points regarding the ban have gotten Trump's attention.
Shortly after the proposed ban was announced, Trump tweeted that he still likes vaping as an alternative to cigarettes. Trump's 2020 campaign manager Brad Parscale also hit back at a Trump follower who tweeted that banning vaping products is "not on brand with MAGA." One administration official said the tweets were prompted by a flood of criticism from conservative leaders.
“Conservative leaders are circulating data to White House staff that claims adults who vape will turn on President Trump if he follows through with his planned ban on flavored e-cigarettes, Axios has learned.”
Crock!
Nonsense. For every vaper who turns against Trump a non-vaper will become a Trump supporter vote for him.
Total BS.
Isn’t this thing that will sink Trump number 465?
Two things can stop Trump’s re-election:
Supporting gun control
Supporting the Cheap Labor Express (including H1b)
Glad to know that axios is looking out for Trump (sarcasm)
NYS has already outlawed the “flavored” kinds.
Horse crap.
I quit smoking 10 years ago thanks to e-cigs.
There are numerous work-arounds if flavored e-liquids are banned.
As long as the hardware is legal, I’ll continue to vape my favorite flavors (butterscotch, peach, and French vanilla).
So there.
“For every Vaper who turns against Trump a non-vaper will become a Trump supporter vote for him.”
Don’t bet on it. I suspect those that are strong anti-Vape proponents are also Lib/Progs that wouldn’t vote for Trump if he came out for abortion.
Whereas Vapers and those that support people to have the choice as to Vape if they so desire are Conservatives /Libertarians and would be miffed if he acted the authoritarian and chipped away at out liberty.
He would be wise to at least stay out of this one, or at most promote any and all regulation be done at the state level..
Biggest BS article I’ve seen today.
Kissing up to Indian job stealers will sink him in 2020!!
+ 10
The people getting sick are vaping with doctored e-juice. They use crap they buy off the street hustlers which contains illicit drugs like THC.
The vast majority of vapers are responsible adults seeking to quit tobacco.
Axios wrote this article.
This is a BS article.
I’d still vote for him again, but we who vape know that restrictions on these products (like 2nd amendment restrictions) will result in more deaths.
Everyone knows that regular cigarettes are SO much better for you.
As long as government gets their revenue.
Marijuana good. Tobacco bad. Who would you rather pilot your plane? Someone vaping tobacco or marijuana? Now you know why our youth and other idiots are whacked. You wonder sometimes why people have idiotic views and crazy ideas. Their either on pot or some other mind altering drug. We not only have useful idiots. We have useless idiots.
The GOP is basically STUPID.
E-cigarettes are less damaging to the environment than cigarettes made with tobacco. However, do young people realize that these products are made by using oil? If they want to save the planet and stop use of oil, then they should give up e-cigs. The plastics and other components come from oil. They use propylene glycol for the mist. Then there’s the lithium batteries that power them. Give up the e-cigs, save the planet!
DACA was supposed to sink him.
Now it’s gun control.
Vaping doesn’t even make the list of the top 500 things that will doom his re-election in 2024.
“Kissing up to Indian job stealers will sink him in 2020!!”
Yeah, that show today with the Premier of India kinda lends to supporting that direction, and that confident post of Lee’s that he will resubmit his H1B bill, and pass it by next Friday sort of clinches which direction the RINO’s are going.
I say everybody send messages to PDJT he’s being led by the RINOs down a path that jeopardizes everything we the people want. IF he approves the H1B’s, we very easily could lose in 2020 no matter the moron running against him.
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