Rantz: Democrats make it more difficult and expensive to quit smoking in Washington

Smoking cigarettes is a deadly habit. But if you were hoping it would be inexpensive to quit, Washington Democrats have something to say about it. In fact, they won’t even make it easy for you.

Senate Bill 5803 imposes an additional tax of up to 95% of the sale on all tobacco-free nicotine products, which include nicotine gum, pouches, patches, and vapes. It also bans flavored nicotine products.

As is often the case, Washington Democrats say they’re doing this to protect kids. The bill claims, for example, that “The growing market for…nicotine products is undermining the nation’s progress in reducing overall youth tobacco use.” This is nonsensical, of course. Washington Democrats are targeting tobacco-free products that contain nicotine.

Their targets are the very products smokers use to stop their deadly habit.

Nicotine isn’t the problem

Nicotine, by itself, is not the harmful chemical in cigarettes. It does not cause cancer. It doesn’t contain tar, carbon monoxide, or the 70+ carcinogens found in burning tobacco.

According to Public Health England and the Royal College of Physicians, nicotine “does not appear to be a significant health hazard” when delivered in clean forms like patches, gum, lozenges, or pouches. In fact, the Royal Society for Public Health (RSPH) declared that nicotine is “no more harmful to health than caffeine.”

In fact, nicotine replacement therapies have been FDA-approved and widely used for decades to help people quit smoking—not because they’re harmless placebos, but because they’re a cleaner way to give your brain what it’s craving without torching your lungs.

Nicotine is also a legitimate cognitive enhancer. Multiple peer-reviewed studies have shown it boosts attention, short-term memory, and reaction time. And a 2010 review in Psychopharmacology found that nicotine improves performance on tasks involving attention, working memory, and fine motor skills.

And appealing flavors—yes, adults like flavors, too, not just kids—make it easier to transition from cigarettes to gum, lozenges, or pouches.

Cigarettes are the problem

The moment you light a cigarette, you’re creating combustion products—and that’s where the real health problem starts.

You’re inhaling tar, carbon monoxide, hydrogen cyanide, benzene, arsenic, formaldehyde, and a parade of other carcinogens. Cigarette smoke contains at least 69 known carcinogens, according to the CDC. That includes chemicals also found in rat poison, lighter fluid, and industrial solvents.

The damage doesn’t stop at cancer, either. Cigarettes wreck your cardiovascular system by promoting inflammation and oxidative stress. That leads to heart disease, stroke, and more.

Why are Democrats making smoking cessation products more expensive?

The Democratic-controlled government says it wants you to quit smoking—but then jacks up taxes on the very products that help you do it? That’s not public health policy. That’s a shakedown for more tax dollars disguised as concern. They have a $16 billion deficit they need to fill, and they’re so desperate and greedy that they’ll prey on people who are trying to quit smoking and save their own lives.

Sin taxes were meant to offset the public costs of unhealthy behaviors. Smoking? Sure. But nicotine pouches like Zyn? Gum? Those don’t carry anywhere near the same health burden. In fact, they help lower it.

So what’s the justification? There isn’t one—other than the fact that it’s an easy cash grab because some Washingtonians are hooked. Typical Democratic move: “We want you to quit…but not without paying us first.”

Washington Democrats are just protecting cigarettes

Ironically, high taxes on safer nicotine products end up protecting cigarettes, even if Democrats want to add $2 a pack in new fees. If it costs nearly as much to buy a pouch as it does to light up a Marlboro, some people will just stick with the cigarette.

If Democrats were truly pro-health, they’d ban the deadly product, not generate more tax revenue off of it. And they’d make it cheaper to purchase smoking cessation products, not demonize them as if they’re as deadly as cigarettes. They certainly wouldn’t pretend they’re doing it to protect kids. After all, it’s already illegal to sell to children.

​Sweden’s “ultra-low smoking rate” is attributed to the widespread use of alternative nicotine products like snus. According to a report by the Tax Foundation, Sweden’s embrace of alternative tobacco products has driven the nation’s smoking rate to the lowest level in the EU. Democrats love to borrow initiatives or strategies from Europe, but I guess only if they’re socialist in nature?

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