Juul suspends its campaign for SF Proposition C

The San Francisco Examiner just reported that Juul has pulled the plug on its effort to pass Prop C, which would replace San Francisco’s current e-cigarette regulations with ones written by Juul.

My guess is that Juul did this for two reasons:

1. The new Juul CEO, Philip Morris executive K.C. Crosthwaite, was put there to get Juul approved by FDA.  Continuing  a campaign that is making illegal health and therapeutic claims was likely not helping that, especially after Supervisor Walton filed a formal compliant with the FDA about them.
2. Their private polling showed them losing or at risk of losing and they wanted to avoid the embarrassment of a defeat.

Unfortunately, Prop C remains on the ballot, which will require the health advocates to continue their campaign to make sure that it loses.  After all, some other tobacco interest could come in and revive the yes campaign.