Amid the ongoing tariff war between President Donald Trump and Chinese president Xi Jinping, another critical front is emerging -- one with serious implications for more than 20 million American adults: the battle to lead in the manufacturing of tobacco harm reduction (THR) products. Chief among these are electronic cigarettes, which remain under intense scrutiny due to their origins and market share competition.

While then-candidate Trump pledged in 2024 to protect flavored vaping, recent congressional hearings and 2025 state legislative sessions reveal that substantial work remains.

Fortunately, President Trump has a unique opportunity to deliver a one-two punch: revitalizing American manufacturing through reforming outdated federal regulations on THR products while pushing back against China’s dominance in the vapor market and curbing the influence of the World Health Organization (WHO). 

At present, China dominates the manufacturing of THR products, especially disposable e-cigarettes. These products -- many unregulated -- continue to flood the U.S. market amid federal ambiguity and lack of enforcement. While this may appear as a win for Chinese exporters, it’s also a reflection of unmet demand by U.S. adults. Millions rely on these alternatives, even as the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), aided by Big Tobacco, works to eliminate them.

It’s a policy paradox -- one that highlights systemic regulatory failures.

As of April 2025, the FDA has authorized only 34 e-cigarette products for sale, all limited to tobacco and menthol flavors and owned exclusively by three major tobacco companies -- the same companies that profit from the continued sale of combustible cigarettes. In 2021, the agency denied millions of product applications, many from American manufacturers, citing youth use concerns rather than evaluating adult cessation benefits.

E-cigarettes have undergone tremendous evolution since their introduction nearly two decades ago -- from early ciga-likes to open systems, pod mods, and disposables -- consistently adapting to changing regulations and consumer preferences. Yet regulatory bodies have failed to adapt in kind, instead reacting with blanket restrictions not grounded in science.

Much of the blame lies with the 2009 Tobacco Control Act (TCA), which granted the FDA authority over tobacco products but failed to anticipate a growing THR marketplace. The TCA arbitrarily set February 15, 2007, as the cutoff date for a product to be “grandfathered” into the market. Products developed after that date must undergo the burdensome, unscientific, and arbitrary premarket tobacco product application (PMTA) process.

The PMTA has proven to be an opaque, inefficient, and anti-competitive mechanism that ignores the science behind harm reduction and the risk continuum -- concepts once championed by former FDA Commissioner Scott Gottlieb.

As of April 2025, only 76 products have been approved through the PMTA process -- a pitiful number when compared to the tens of thousands of combustible cigarette and cigar products still legally sold.

This flawed regulatory approach echoes the global agenda of the WHO’s Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC). Though the U.S. signed but never ratified the treaty, it still sends delegates to observe the biennial Conference of the Parties (COP) meetings -- most recently with FDA representation at COP10 in Panama. The FCTC, heavily influenced by anti-vaping philanthropist Michael R. Bloomberg, promotes policies such as excessive taxation, public smoking bans, and prohibition of harm reduction alternatives.

Despite the U.S. being home to one of the world’s largest vaping populations, our domestic regulatory landscape is increasingly shaped by foreign ideologies hostile to THR. Like congressional sponsors of the TCA, the FCTC celebrates product bans rather than embracing innovative solutions that offer smokers safer alternatives.

This is a public health failure that defies both evidence and logic.

President Trump has already indicated his willingness to withdraw U.S. support from other WHO initiatives. He should go further by calling on Congress to reform outdated federal tobacco laws that are strangling American innovation and consumer choice. Fixing the PMTA process and removing barriers for U.S. manufacturers would both curb Chinese market dominance and send a clear signal to the WHO: the United States is ready to lead the next chapter in global tobacco policy -- one that puts public health and personal freedom first.

Mark Anton is former Executive Director of the Smokefree Alternatives Trade Association and vaping advocate based in New Jersey.

Image: Vaping360