Some Lubbock owners of vape shops have been lobbying for a bill in D.C. say will allow them to stay in business.
For many smokers vaping has been a way to quit cigarettes, but the relatively newer industry may be snuffed out by the feds.
"If they go through and the FDA passes what they want to, most vape shops will be shut down," said 180 Vape owner, Kim Pharr.
Schell Hammel, Texas president of the Smoke-Free Alternative Trade Association, said this move will affect vapers, store owners, manufacturers and what could be as many as 10 million. To try to prevent that, members of SAFTA went to Capitol Hill.
"We were trying to get support from the congressman to change HR2058," Hammel said. "Which is a bill that was introduced by Congressman Cole so we could change the grandfather date to the current date."
Kim Pharr said they asked several congressmen to support HR2058 and to get vaping separated from TCA - or the Tobacco Control Act.
When the act was passed in 2006, existing products were grandfathered in.
"Any new tobacco product after 2007 had to either show it is substantially equivalent to a product that's on the market or it has to go through a pre-market process," Cap O'Rourke with SAFTA said.
But there were almost no electronic cigarettes or vapor products on the market in 2007.
"This would pretty much mean that every item on the market right now is going to have to go through a pre-market authorization plan," O'Rourke said.
Since this was passed, only one product has been able to complete the process. "That was a product out from one of the largest tobacco companies in the world and it was the application was over 400,000 pages long," O'Rourke said.
If the regulations go through, "it would literally wipe out all the e-cigarette businesses or vaper shops across the country," Hammel said.
O'Rourke said, "there is not a vaping shop or company big enough to be able to afford this for all of their current products."
It would either send the industry underground or big tobacco would pick it up. "They'll control it and it'll just be all in the convenience stores and our customers wont get the knowledge and the training that they need in order to operate the device and to help them actually gain what they are looking for by switching to E-cigarettes," Kim Pharr said.
If HR2058 is passed, "it'll allow us to sell the current products but its actually just a band-aid for now until we can get the FDA to put us into a different category - our own category - so that vaping can continue to grow," said Travis Pharr, who co-owns 180 Vape with his wife, Kim.
"Trying to put us and compare us to tobacco is not even the same," O'Rourke said. "There really are two separate - not even do we have separate products - we really have separate business models. Big tobacco, their products have over 4,000 known toxins and carcinogens. They're know to be deadly to people and they sell them everywhere."
The American Lung Association said it's concerned about the potential health consequences of e-cigarettes.
"There has not been a study yet that has shown there are harmful levels of toxins when used under regular use, but more importantly the majority of our products are sold in specific stores dedicated to vaping with experienced staff who know how to demonstrate proper use," O'Rourke said. "Our products are designed for people who are looking to break away from the use of combustible tobacco products."
Many got into the industry because they were smokers themselves and now want to help others.
Travis said "the whole reason we went to Washington to try and help, inform, teach everyone about vaping and what we're trying to do to help people quit smoking."
"We know that smoking kills over 400 thousand every year in the U.S." O'Rourke said.
SAFTA said they do not know when the regulations will be released.
With Photojournalist Jordan Belt
Samantha Waddell
