Transcript: Mayor Adams, Corporation Counsel Hinds-Radix Announce Lawsuit Against 11 Companies Illegally Distributing Disposable Flavored E-Cigarettes

April 4, 2024

Assistant Deputy Mayor Louis Molina, Public Safety: Good afternoon. We are here today to make an announcement that involves both public safety and public health. Those go hand in hand, especially when we are talking about protecting our kids, which we are here to do today. We're also here to send a message to anyone doing business in New York City that it is unacceptable to break the law and jeopardize the health and safety of our kids in the name of profits. Unacceptable.    

I'm joined here today by my colleagues, Deputy Mayor for Health and Human Services Anne Williams-Isom, Corporation Counsel Sylvia Hinds-Radix, our sheriff, Anthony Miranda, the founding director of NYC Cannabis, Dasheeda Dawson, and commissioner of the New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene, Dr. Ashwin Vasan. We are also joined by some very important partners from Parents Against Vaping E-cigarettes, co-founder, Dorian Fuhrman, and her team. I want to thank them for speaking up and taking action to protect our kids.

Conversations about staying safe and healthy start at home, but this group has gone even further to sound the alarm about these dangerous trends. My hat's off to you for the working and safeguarding our children's future. We are also joined by Vonetta Dudley, the director of NYC Smoke-Free, and her members. Last but certainly not least, our mayor, the mayor of New York City, Mayor Eric Adams. With that, I'd like to turn it over to Mayor Adams.

Mayor Eric Adams: Thank you. Thanks so much, Assistant Deputy Mayor Molina and the entire crew that's here. Even before I start, subway riders were happy to wake up and see that — when we talk about the perception and ending the perception, kudos to the Daily News, cop surge cuts crime, adding hundreds of officers to subway patrol brings stats down 23 percent in the month of March. It just sends a message that part of the police doing their right job, when you're sitting on the train and you're reading a paper like this, it makes you feel good about the city, and it makes you feel good about the men and women who have dedicated their lives to keeping our city safe and how we want to continue to do that.

I really want to commend them for highlighting that we're going to continue to move in the right direction to keep our city safe.

Part of safety is not only those who are participating in criminal behavior, with violence, but it is the safety of our children. That is why we are here today. It's something that corporation counsel has been extremely aggressive on. Judge Sylvia Hinds-Radix knows how important it is to use the corp counsel to go after those who target our young people. You look at these billboards that are here. It is some of the items that are being used to focus on our young people. This is in alignment with our commitment of public safety, revitalizing our economy, and making our city livable for working-class people. This is at the heart of that. 

Today we stand with the Corp Counsel Sylvia Hinds-Radix to announce that we have filed a lawsuit against 11 wholesalers for their part in the illegal sale and shipment of flavor disposable cigarettes which are the most widely used vaping devices among our middle school and high school youth. This is a real health problem and these civilian organizations that are stepping up and being a part of this issue I really want to thank them so much because it plays a vital role. 

Nicotine addiction among middle and high school youth is exploding thanks to no small part to the actions of businesses like these 11 defenders. They target young people by using colorful child-friendly cartoon character packaging on e-cigarettes. Here, these colors are used for a particular reason to attract young people to use them. They also sell flavors like strawberry colada, mellow mint, blueberry energized, and frozen creamsicle, flavors that are designed to tempt young people. Flavored e-cigarettes are the gateway to nicotine addiction, 81 percent of first-time users ages 12 to 17 started with flavored products.

Most have never, never previously smoked. This is their introduction to smoking. An overwhelming majority of youth e-cigarette users choose to vape because they were attracted to their flavors. To be clear, our city has already banned flavored e-cigarettes, but we have conclusive evidence that these 11 defenders continue to sell flavored disposable e-cigarettes to retail stores and consumers in and around New York City in direct violation of the law. 

We will not allow the greedy, harmful, and openly illegal behavior to continue. We will not sit idly by as these nicotine pushes continue to, one, harm the health of our children. Two, put our kids on the path to addiction. Three, make them customers and users for life, and finally expose our youth to unknown long-term health effects. 

Dr. Vasan has talked about this over and over, this use of these e-cigarettes have major impacts on the long-term health impacts of our children. We're going to do whatever we can that it takes to keep our children safe and enforce the law when it comes to illegal vape sales.

Today's lawsuit also once again delivers on commitments made earlier this year and our State of the City address to shut down illegal smoke shops. For too long, Black and brown communities have faced high rates of drug-related incarceration through the discriminatory "war on drugs" and have been denied opportunities to build wealth. Now they have a chance to get in on the cannabis industry from the ground up but in order to support the legal market, we have to address the illegal market and shut down bad actors like these 11 wholesalers selling illegal products.

You're seeing these illegal shops all over our city. Our goal is to partner with our lawmakers to shut them down. Hats off to individuals and bill proposals like the bill that Assemblywoman Rajkumar and Senator Comrie and their smoke-out bill that they're proposing and we want other bills that's come forward. 

Kudos to Governor Hochul for including this in her budget and stating that we must take a deep dive and look into these illegal shops. I think it's a combination of finding the right balance with Assemblywoman Crystal Peoples and others who are there to say we can get this done. There's a deal to be made, but we must make the deal, but we have to do it right.

The sheriff must be partnered with other law enforcement entities to go after the facilities. If we're given the power, my commitment to this city, in 30 days you will see these illegal shops disappear from the landscape of our retail institute but we need the authority to get it done. 

While simultaneously supporting the equitable growth of the legal cannabis market, Dasheeda Dawson, who's leading this effort for the city, she knows and we know that we can get it right if we take the right step forward, and this lawsuit is part of that, so I'm proud.

New York City, New York State, we're leading the way, both in terms of penalizing illegal e-cigarette sales and developing a national model for what the legal cannabis industry can and should look like. We can get it done and we can get it done right. Thank you very much.

Assistant Deputy Mayor Molina:  Now you'll hear from the City's Corporation Counsel, Judge Sylvia Hinds-Radix.

Sylvia Hinds-Radix, Corporation Counsel, Law Department: Good afternoon, everybody. Thank you, Mayor Adams and Deputy Mayor Molina, for that kind introduction and may I thank Deputy Mayor Williams-Isom for joining us and Dr. Vasan and certainly Sheriff Miranda and all of the other agency partners and elected officials who continue with us to fight for public health. 

Numerous health authorities — before I go on to that, let me recognize from my office, Eric Proshansky, who is the brain trust behind this complaint that we filed today.

Numerous health authorities, including the New York City Department of Health, tell us that e-cigarettes provide nicotine levels exceeding those of conventional cigarettes. The experts also tell us that there has been an increase in the number of middle and high school vapers following the introduction of disposable favorite e-cigarettes. Laws at every level of government have been passed to address this public health issue. Yet, ongoing investigations by our office, the sheriff, and other agency partners reveal companies continuing to break the law and to put our youth at risk.

In July of 2023, the city took a significant enforcement step against four major distributors through a federal lawsuit that we put to stop illegal sales by these defendants. Two of them have been resolved and two litigation continues against. 

We are also working cooperatively with the major delivery services including the US Postal Service to prevent illegal deliveries of vaping products into New York City. While we are engaged in these efforts, we are taking additional steps to cut off the source of these illegal sales.

That is why today the City of New York commenced a legal action in Manhattan Supreme Court targeting 11 wholesalers and distributors of e-cigarettes who are fueling the vaping epidemic amongst our young people. 

The city is asking the court to permanently enjoin each defendant from violating the public health law from shipping or causing to be shipped vapor products intended to be reasonably expected to be used for the consumption of nicotine to persons unauthorized to receive just products and the city is also asking the court to permanently enjoin each defendant from violating the New York City administrative code by selling or offering to sell or possessing with intent to sell these flavored electronic cigarettes.

We also are asking that the defendants are caused to maintain and declare that what the defendants are doing is causing and maintaining a public nuisance and require the defendants to undertake measures to abate the nuisance, including, but not limited to establishing a fund. 

City investigations reveal that over the last two years, defendants have sold millions of dollars worth of flavored disposable e-cigarettes to retail stores throughout the city and directly to consumers in the city through the internet in violation of multiple federal states and local laws. These illegal sales are ongoing and need to be prevented.

Defendants offer dozens of youth-friendly flavors. The mayor listed some of those, but there's still more. There's Juicy Peach, there's a Hawaii Punch and there's Cotton Candy, which are easily accessible to young children throughout our city, as easily accessible as a package of gum. 

Equally concerning to us is that many of the defendant's products come in cartoon characters. Packaging are so child-friendly as to require a cautionary label indicating it is not a toy. Simply put, defendants are undermining the health of our youth and creating a public nuisance in our communities.

We will not tolerate it and we will hold these companies accountable and that's why we have commenced this legal action. I thank you.

Assistant Deputy Mayor Molina: I'd like to turn it over now to the co-founder of Parents Against Vaping e-cigarettes, Dorian Fuhrman.

Dorian Fuhrman, Co-Founder, Parents Against Vaping E-cigarettes: Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Mayor. Thank you, judge. Thank you everyone up here. 

I'm Dorian Fuhrman from Parents Against Vaping e-cigarettes, and we represent families around the country and also in New York. We are a New York-founded organization and we're glad to stand beside you as you announced this important action. It's the first step. There's so much more that needs to be done. 

Thousands of these stores around the city are selling these dangerous and unregulated flavored nicotine vaping products. They're illegal. We helped pass the law in 2019/2020 in New York City and also in New York State, and yet these distributors continue to supply these vape products to smoke shops around the city. 

As has been said, multiple times these flavored e-cigarettes contain enormous amounts of nicotine, which can permanently change a developing adolescent's brain and can lead to a lifetime of nicotine addiction. Parents around the city have had enough. We hear from parents daily. Our kids deserve to grow up healthy, they deserve to be safe, and they deserve to walk to school every day and not be confronted by these thousands of vape shops pushing these flavored dangerous products. Many of them pouring in through our ports from China who has banned them in their own country as well. 

So thank you Mayor Adams. Thank you to the corporation counsel. Thank you to all the officials up here because we stand beside you and we want to protect our children. Thank you.

Assistant Deputy Mayor Molina: Lastly, I'd like to turn it over to Vonetta Dudley for NYC Smoke-Free.

Vonetta Dudley, Director, NYC Smoke-Free: Thank you. Good afternoon, everyone. My name is Vonetta Dudley, and I'm the director of NYC Smoke-Free at Public Health Solutions. Public Health Solutions is the largest not-for-profit health agency in New York City supporting vulnerable New York City families in achieving optimal health and building pathways to reach their potential. 

NYC Smoke-Free, a program of public health solutions, works to foster environments supportive of policies that reinforce tobacco free norms in communities in New York City. At NYC Smoke-Free, we educate communities about the dangers of tobacco use. We work closely with our youth through our youth action arm Reality Check to bring awareness that big tobacco targets them to use these products that are harmful to their health. 

Today we are here to build awareness among the public on the dangers of tobacco use, specifically e-cigarettes in New York City. Many times we hear the youth tell us how they see these products in the community, colorful products that look like candy and have been added with flavors that are used to entice and attract them.

E-cigarettes, and or a vape device, uses a battery to heat up a liquid solution into an aerosol that users inhale. E-cigarettes contain nicotine. Nicotine is an addictive drug found in tobacco products, therefore e-cigarettes are considered a tobacco product. In New York City, 28,000 public high school students smoke e-cigarettes or use a vape product. 

No matter how it is delivered, nicotine is addictive and it can harm adolescent brain development. The use of e-cigarettes is strongly linked to the use of other tobacco products including combustible cigarettes, cigars, hookah, and smokeless tobacco, especially among the youth. We must ensure that our youth are protected and informed of these dangerous and harmful products especially since they impact their health. 

According to the Centers of Disease Control, 2.5 million U.S. middle and high school students reported e-cigarette use in 2022. In 2023, the CDC also reported that 89 percent of youth use flavored e-cigarette varieties, fruit flavor being the most reported at 63 percent, candy, dessert, and other sweets at 35 percent, mint flavor at 27 percent, and menthol at 20 percent. Tobacco companies add these flavors, for example, menthol flavor, to their products to attract more youth, African Americans, and the LGBTQIA+ communities, as well as to mask the taste of this product.

Some may argue that the use of e-cigarettes may prevent smoking. However, there is no evidence to support this claim. Others argue that e-cigarettes can help smokers quit by curbing their nicotine cravings. However, there is no conclusive evidence to support this, and e-cigarettes are not FDA-approved as a quit aid. 

What we do know is that the more youth see this product in the local community and have access to them, the more they want to try them and become addicted.

I am here to remind everyone that any type of tobacco product, even when combined with a flavor, can be harmful to the user. It is unfortunate for our youth to fall prey or victim to big tobacco. Parents, educators, community leaders, and the youth themselves are tired of seeing big tobacco and their products in their community.

It's time that we bring a change to our community and our change for our youth's future. We need to continue pushing education to ensure our youth learn the truth and dangers of use of these products. Thank you.

Question: Hello.

Mayor Adams: How are you?

Question: Good. How are you today?

Mayor Adams: I'm well.

Question: You seem in good spirits. I wanted to ask, the lawsuit asked for monetary damages. I want to know how much that is, and is that going to go towards enforcement and education? 

Then I wanted to know, is there something in local law that you could possibly change? You mentioned you've already engaged in a lawsuit with some of these companies already, and that's not stopping them from selling the e-cigarettes. Is there something that needs to be done on the local level then?

Hinds-Radix: That is never precluded. It's always an option that we can look to. Let me answer the question with reference to damages. I know that is always an issue that you want to hear about, but this lawsuit is new. 

Our main focus at this time is to try to discourage and prevent this behavior. As the litigation proceeds, we would ask the court for the damages, and that's where the damages would be worked out. Certainly, we're not saying that the city is not seeking damages here.

Question: Would you use it for education and enforcement, or where would it go?

Hinds-Radix: Well, I would have to ask the mayor about that. I think in his budgetary discussions, he would know where he wants this to go. For him, education is always a huge issue and a big option, so I'd leave that to him.

Mayor Adams: Yes. We need as much, as we were talking earlier with some of the organizations that are here. There needs to be a built-in program for our young people because they're being targeted. We need to use the captive audience of a school and classroom to really educate young people on vaping and the dangers of vaping. 

People don't realize not only the nicotine addictions but also how it impacts your entire body. That is why this needs to be built into educating young people.

Question: Could you tell us what's different with this lawsuit versus the lawsuit filed in 2023, and what's the status of that lawsuit?

Mayor Adams: The Judge can go through that.

Hinds-Radix: The lawsuit that we filed in '23 also had a federal component. We are still continuing that. We have filed that against four individuals. Two of those have been concluded, and we're still continuing with these two. Here on this is just a major continuation of what we have seen in this behavior, and so we've decided as a legal strategy to continue that here.

Question: Hi, Mr. Mayor.

Mayor Adams: How are you?

Question: Good. I was wondering if you could comment on Governor Abbott being here today for the 

Republican…

[Crosstalk.] 

…and whether you and Judge Radix have talked about serving him with a lawsuit today over the microphone.

Mayor Adams: I'm going to take executive privilege and answer your question. I'm going to offer him a stay in one of the HERRC’s so he can see what he has created and understand how we are treating people with the dignity and respect that he should have been shown as well. 

I'm not quite sure why he's here and what he's doing while here but he's going to see how you can manage the crises with coordination. Not one child or family sleeping on the streets of the city of New York. When we coordinate together, we should not displace problems to local municipalities. That is not what executives do. It is unfortunate that he made the decision to do that.

[Crosstalk.]

Question: Mr. Mayor, how are you?

Mayor Adams: How are you doing?

Question: I'm just fine. I think it's more for the corporation counsel. I just want to go back to Miles' question. Could you just explain what is the federal component that would preclude you from just filing an amended lawsuit here opposed to them bringing this into state court with these other companies?

Eric Proshansky, Deputy Chief, Division of Affirmative Litigation, Law Department: It's just a strategic decision as to which causes of action we bring. There are federal claims in the federal suit and we have state and local claims in the state and local suit. We'd like to use as many enforcement mechanisms as we can. This is simply spreading out the enforcement.

Question: Expound upon like actually what those strategies, specifically what is it because of certain state law or you've already tapped into two federal statutes that allow you to do it. This is giving you x, y, and z.

Proshansky: Well, this will give us rulings under state and local law. The federal suit will give us rulings under federal law. It multiplies our ammunition, basically. It'll have the courts passing, these are all new statutes. Nobody has brought these suits before. The city is the first government entity that I'm aware of that's bringing these kind of lawsuits. 

We want to look at each of our weapons, each of the statutory weapons, and see which ones of them are the most effective.We're trying state and local laws in state and local court and principally federal in federal court.

Question: Mayor, you mentioned that the war on drugs was a failure and drug prohibition didn't work. Why are you artificially throttling the market for marijuana? Why not just open up the licenses to everybody the same way you have licenses for alcohol, et cetera? Why are we having a new program?

Mayor Adams: Because it's really challenging for people to finally realize I'm no longer a state senator, I'm the mayor, so I don't make the laws in Albany, and I think that question is something you should present to the lawmakers in Albany. 

I think our team here with Director Dawson has made it clear that there's a way to do it that we don't harm people. We don't want to be heavy-handed, but if we don't regulate the illegal market, then we're going to hurt the overall goal here. I think that's the question you should present to the lawmakers. I have no control over that at all.

[Crosstalk.]

Mayor Adams: Hold on, hold on, hold on. I have a what?

Question: Do you have a position on it? Whether the market should be artificially [inaudible] or whether it should be open to all the same way you regulate alcohol?

Mayor Adams: You said do I have a position or opinion?

Question: Opinion and position.

Mayor Adams: There's a difference between a position and opinion. What I've learned not to do from being in Albany while they're trying to figure out what they're going to do, don't hurt these delicate days. 

These days before that final budget, you start throwing new stuff into the game, you can take away all the wins that you have. Crystal Peoples and others. Diane Savino who's now on my team, who has been back and forth to Albany, with Jenifer Rajkumar, Leroy Comrie, what all of them are trying to do is how do we find that sweet spot? How do we get it right? That's their job to do. 

They have to come up with a mechanism that's not going to hurt the legal market. If that means expansion, I'm welcome to allow them to do that. If that means limiting, I'm welcome to do that. 

I just need the power here so that our law enforcement agencies can go and close down these illegal shops that have become a magnet for violence, for robberies, for illegal use of products like we're seeing here. These illegal shops have become a magnet that's attracting all the things that is wrong with the legalization of cannabis.

 I need to get them closed. I'm able to get them closed if they give me the authorization to get them closed. I'll take this problem and we will close it down.

Question: Hi, Mr. Mayor.

Mayor Adams: Yes.

Question: As you know, you already spoke about illegal pot shops, as you know state lawmakers are currently debating how to close that loophole to make it so you guys can close them down. What specifically are you looking for from state lawmakers in order for you guys to enforce this?

Also the former governor just recently did an interview saying that the city just needs to enforce the law. Can you help explain and get your reaction to that and just why it's more difficult than just enforcing the law? [Inaudible]. 

Mayor Adams: Right now, I think Sheriff Miranda has about 129 offices assigned to him. He has done an amazing job with the small manpower that he has and the time it takes to actually close one of these shops is very labor-intensive. 

When you look at the numbers that we have and so if we are able to expand the authorization to do those inspections, confiscation, locking up the places by using all of our law enforcement tools, we can get it done. We can map out and grid the city based on precincts. We can go in and do an analysis where the shops are located and then we can execute a real plan that's going to utilize all of our manpower.

I'm amazed at what Sheriff Miranda has been able to do with the limited amount of manpower and that's not the only role that a sheriff does. Sheriff is doing so many other things, but he has focused on how do we deal with these shops. 

Right now the practice is not meeting the punishment that should be associated with it. What we need is to be able to use all of our law enforcement entities to be able to go in, identify the location, close the location, permanently close the location, and confiscate the items they're selling. That is what's missing and that's what we're hoping we're going to get. Okay. Thank you, Judge.