WASHINGTON (AP) -- A House panel is again trying to exempt increasingly popular e-cigarettes from new Food and Drug Administration rules.
The legislation by the Republican-controlled Appropriations Committee would prevent the FDA from requiring retroactive safety reviews of e-cigarettes already on the market. It would exempt some premium and large cigars from those same regulations. E-cigarette products introduced in the future would face the safety reviews.
Supporters say that "vaping" is far safer than smoking tobacco cigarettes. They say FDA rules would lead small companies that produce the products to go out of business rather than undergo expensive regulatory reviews.
Democrats said the products are dangerous and are targeted at children. They succeeded earlier this year in blocking the move to exempt existing products on an earlier spending bill.
