# Juul **Juul** (Juul Labs) is the e-cigarette company whose USB-shaped device, launched in **June 2015**, became shorthand for the teen-vaping epidemic of the late 2010s. It spent most of the following decade fighting the [[FDA]] for permission to stay on the market. In **March 2025**, [[1789 Capital]], the venture firm where [[Donald Trump Jr.]] is a partner, bought a stake. Four months later the FDA authorized Juul's products for sale for the first time. That sequence is why Juul is in this vault. ## Origins and the epidemic Adam Bowen and James Monsees met at Stanford and founded Ploom in 2007. The company was later renamed Pax Labs, launched the JUUL device in 2015, and spun Juul Labs out as a separate company in 2017. High nicotine salts in a discreet device, sold in flavors like mango and crème, made it the dominant e-cigarette among teenagers. It also made Juul the main defendant in the litigation that followed. **The tobacco-industry turn.** On **December 20, 2018**, Altria (the parent of Philip Morris USA) paid **$12.8 billion for 35%** of Juul, which valued the company at $38 billion. The investment collapsed. On **March 3, 2023**, Altria gave up its entire stake, then carried at $250 million, in exchange for a license to Juul's heated-tobacco technology. ## The regulatory war (2019–2024) - **Trump's first-term flavor reversal.** In September 2019 Trump announced plans to ban flavored e-cigarettes. The January 2020 rule was much narrower: it banned only fruit and sweet *cartridge* pods (Juul's format) and exempted menthol, tobacco and open-tank liquids. - **The FDA ban order.** On **June 23, 2022** the FDA ordered all Juul products off the market. A federal appeals court stayed the order the next day, the FDA suspended it itself in July 2022, and it withdrew the order on **June 6, 2024**, under the Biden administration, which put Juul's applications back under review. - **Settlements.** Juul paid **$438.5 million** to 34 states and territories in September 2022. In December 2022 it settled about 10,000 private lawsuits, and the amount was never disclosed: Bloomberg reported **$1.2 billion** and the New York Times **$1.7 billion**. On **April 12, 2023** it paid **$462 million** to New York, California, Colorado, Illinois, Massachusetts, New Mexico and D.C. - **The 2024 campaign.** On September 20, 2024 Trump posted: "I saved Flavored Vaping in 2019 … I'll save vaping again!" ## 1789 Capital and the authorization (2025–2026) | Date | Event | |---|---| | March 2025 | 1789 Capital invests in Juul. A Juul spokesperson told Reuters the stake was worth about **$5 million**; Forbes and others confirm the stake exists, but the amount traces to that one statement | | **July 17, 2025** | FDA authorizes five Juul products: the device and Virginia Tobacco and Menthol pods at 3% and 5% nicotine | | May 2026 | FDA authorizes its first fruit-flavored vapes (from Glas), reportedly after pressure from Trump. Commissioner [[Marty Makary]] resigns over the flavored-vape dispute (May 12 or 13, depending on the outlet). The Wall Street Journal reported Trump signed off on his removal; that detail is single-sourced | | Aug 27–28, 2026 | FDA authorizes **JUUL2**, a new device with 1.6% tobacco and menthol pods and an optional age-verification app | | Aug 26, 2026 | [[Jamie Raskin]]'s letter to 1789 Capital lists the Juul stake and the July 2025 authorization among four examples of "insider political influence" | **What the record does and does not show.** The timeline lines up: 1789 bought in, and the authorization followed. But the review was already pending, because the Biden FDA withdrew the ban order in June 2024, before Trump returned to office. No reporting so far shows 1789 or Trump Jr. contacting the FDA about Juul. The case for a conflict rests on proximity and on the pattern across 1789's other holdings (see [[1789 Capital]] and [[Omeed Malik]]), not on a documented intervention. **The nicotine through-line.** 1789 also led the 2023 seed round for the [[Tucker Carlson Network]], whose co-owned ALP nicotine-pouch brand helped pay for that company's 2025 investor buyout. The anti-regulatory right's media and money layers both have a stake in nicotine products. ## See Also - [[1789 Capital]] · [[Omeed Malik]] · [[Donald Trump Jr.]] - [[FDA]] · [[Marty Makary]] - [[Tucker Carlson Network]] — ALP nicotine pouches - [[Trump Family Corruption Ecosystem]]