By all appearances, that would allow the FDA to prohibit the use of certain flavorings, including menthol. The 2009 law went ahead and did just that, banning the use of “characterizing flavors ...

Here’s what the data shows about demographics of cigarette smokers: Tobacco user health disparities ... they represented 40% of excess deaths due to menthol cigarette smoking, according to the CDC.

In “Pushing Cool: Big Tobacco, Racial Marketing and the Untold Story of the Menthol Cigarette,” Keith Wailoo, the Henry Putnam University Professor of History and Public Affairs at Princeton University, documents the history of menthol cigarettes and racial marketing, setting the context for the impending FDA decision.

The state’s adult cigarette smoking rate has declined dramatically over 30 years, according to a 2019 report from the California Department of Public Health’s Tobacco Control Program.

After the release of director Spike Lee's "Malcolm X," a tobacco company created Menthol X, which was booted in 1995 after a significant outcry. Its box featured a large X like the film's poster ...