Washington State

Office of the Attorney General

Attorney General

Bob Ferguson

SEATTLE — Attorney General Bob Ferguson announced a legally binding agreement with a California-based company that was caught in a sweep of online vaping retailers. The company, E-Juice Vapor Inc., will pay $375,000 to resolve a lawsuit Ferguson brought in August 2020 after its initial refusal to cooperate with the investigation.
OLYMPIA — Attorney General Bob Ferguson today announced a Pennsylvania online tobacco retailer, Smoker’s Outlet Online, will pay $65,885 after it illegally sent tobacco products to Washington state. The payment will go toward continued enforcement of state tobacco laws. Smoker’s Outlet Online made this payment to avoid a lawsuit from the Attorney General’s Office.
SEATTLE — Attorney General Bob Ferguson today announced the results of a sweep cracking down on illegal internet vaping sales into Washington. As a result of the sweep, five companies caught violating Washington’s age verification law — including one based in Spokane — will pay a total of $132,000 to the Attorney General’s Office, which will go toward continued enforcement of the law. Moreover, the five companies entered into legally binding agreements to change their advertising and online sales practices to comply with Washington’s youth access law. The Attorney General’s Office has or will file lawsuits against two more companies for the same issues.
Attorney General Bob Ferguson today filed a consumer protection lawsuit against e-cigarette company JUUL. Ferguson’s lawsuit, filed in King County Superior Court, asserts JUUL violated the state Consumer Protection Act by designing and marketing its products to appeal to underage consumers and deceiving consumers about the addictiveness of its product. JUUL’s unlawful conduct fueled a pervasive and staggering rise in e-cigarette use and nicotine addiction among youth.
SEATTLE — Attorney General Bob Ferguson filed a lawsuit today against an Orange County-based company that marketed vapor products containing nicotine in a way that appealed to youth, then sold the products without verifying the buyers’ ages. The company, E-Juice Vapors, failed to comply with numerous age verification requirements intended to prevent youth from purchasing vapor products online. Moreover, E-Juice Vapors never received a license from the state to deliver vapor products into Washington as required by Washington law.
OLYMPIA — Today, with a bipartisan vote of 33-12 in the Washington State Senate, the Washington State Legislature passed legislation to raise the sale age for tobacco and vapor products to 21.
Attorney General Bob Ferguson will continue his push to raise the legal age to purchase tobacco and vapor products to 21 tomorrow before the House Health Care & Wellness Committee.
TACOMA — Four people under prosecution by the Attorney General’s Criminal Litigation Unit for charges related to evading cigarette taxes entered guilty pleas mid-trial yesterday. The defendants imported hundreds of thousands of cigarettes from other states or tribal reservations, then sold them at their Puyallup smoke shop without paying required taxes.
OLYMPIA — Attorney General Bob Ferguson’s agency-request bill to raise the sale age of tobacco and vapor products to 21 today passed the House Health Care & Wellness Committee in a bipartisan 9-3 vote.
OLYMPIA — A Stuart Elway poll released today shows an overwhelming 65 percent of Washingtonians support raising the sale age of tobacco to 21. This result shows clear public support for Washington State Attorney General Bob Ferguson’s proposal to raise the legal age to purchase tobacco and vapor products to 21.

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