In April 2025, the nine most powerful jurists in America convened to address a matter of grave national importance. They were not ruling on the death penalty, habeas corpus, or the separation of powers. Instead, they were ruling on whether strawberry should be permitted as a vape flavor.
They decided, unanimously, that they should not.
Justice Samuel Alito (a man who has previously ruled on abortion, gun rights, and the limits of presidential immunity) wrote forty-six pages explaining why the Food and Drug Administration was correct to block e-liquids with names like Killer Kustard Blueberry. The reasoning, in essence, was that such flavors might appeal to teenagers, and teenagers might become addicted to nicotine, and therefore no adult in America should be allowed to purchase fruity vape juice ever again.
In Britain, strawberry vape juice remains freely available in every corner shop and online store, and for the first time in recorded history, there are now more vapers than smokers. Make of that what you will.
The Logic, Such As It Is
The FDA’s position, upheld by the highest court in the land, rests on a single premise: flavors that taste good are inherently suspicious. Anything remotely enjoyable, such as strawberry, mango, or crème brûlée, is presumed to be a gateway to youth addiction, regardless of who is actually buying it.
The evidence is, charitably, incomplete at best. Yes, teenagers who vape tend to prefer flavors, but then teenagers who eat food also prefer flavors. This tells us nothing about whether banning strawberry e-liquid will reduce youth nicotine use, and nothing about whether it will help adult smokers quit.
Meanwhile, Across the Atlantic
The UK took a different approach, which can be summarized thusly: let adults buy what they want, enforce age restrictions properly, and see what happens.
What happened was that smoking rates collapsed. Vaping became the most popular method of quitting. Various popular flavors such as strawberry vape juice, mango, dessert blends, and everything else the FDA considers too dangerous for American adults, turned out to be one of the main reasons people successfully switched. It turns out that the distance from cigarette taste was the feature, not the flaw.
British youth vaping rates, incidentally, remain lower than those in the United States. The predicted epidemic of strawberry-addicted children was not forthcoming. Over there, the flavors are still on the shelves, yet the public health outcomes are infinitely better. Nobody has convened a Supreme Court case about it, because there is nothing to argue about – the facts speak for themselves.
A Brief Word on Mortality
Here is a number the Supreme Court probably did not consider: four hundred and eighty thousand. That is how many Americans die from cigarette-related illness every year.
Here is another number: zero. That is how many Americans have died from strawberry vape juice.
The FDA’s position is that the theoretical risk of teenagers enjoying a flavor outweighs the actual, measurable, annual catastrophe of cigarette deaths. This is not a policy designed to save lives. It is a policy designed to look like it is saving lives, which is not the same thing, but it polls considerably better, doesn’t it?
Adult smokers who might have switched are left with two options: tobacco-flavored e-liquid, which tastes like a reminder of what they are trying to quit, or cigarettes, which will kill them. The Supreme Court, in all its wisdom, has decided this is acceptable.
The Adult in the Room
It seems there is a particular strain of American public health thinking that simply cannot tolerate adults enjoying things. The logic dictates that if a product is pleasurable, it might be dangerous. If it is dangerous, it must be banned. In turn, if banning it creates worse outcomes, that is someone else’s problem.
Strawberry vape juice is, demonstrably, not a threat to public health. It is a flavor that makes quitting smoking slightly less miserable for millions of adults trying to do so. The idea that the Supreme Court needed to rule on this would be funny if the consequences were not measured in body bags.
Britain figured this out years ago, while America is still sending the question to the highest court in the land. One country has more vapers than smokers, while the other has Justice Alito explaining why blueberries are a matter of constitutional concern.
Somewhere in America tonight, a smoker who might have quit, had they been afforded a wider range of flavor choices, will light another cigarette instead. Ultimately, the Supreme Court has rapped its gavel, the matter is settled, and the tobacco industry didn’t even have to pay for the ruling.
