Look out, JUUL, the government’s coming after you. Again.

Almost 40 states announced yesterday plans to investigate the e-cigarette maker due to ‘concerns’ on their marketing. Texas Republican Attorney General Ken Paxton grimly warned JUUL could be targeting teens while not discussing e-cigarettes safety.

I am pleased to be working alongside other states to determine whether any of JUUL’s statements or business practices mislead or otherwise harmed consumers. Protecting Texans from deceptive business practices is a high priority for my office, and I am committed to holding companies accountable for the quality, effects, and marketing of their products.

Democrat Connecticut Attorney General William Tong’s comment on the probe presented an even more dire case.

Connecticut’s investigation into JUUL is active and expanding…We are also looking at claims made by JUUL regarding nicotine content and statements they have made regarding the risks, safety and effectiveness as a smoking cessation tool. I will not prejudge where this investigation will lead, but we will follow every fact and are prepared to take strong action in conjunction with states across the nation to protect public health.

High comedy on not ‘prejudging’ because we all pretty much know what’s going to happen: the government will likely present ‘evidence’ suggesting JUUL targeted minors, a judge will agree, and JUUL will have to pay a massive fine. The federal government, either by legislation or by executive action, will end up banning or severely restricting vape sales and vapers will go back to smoking cigarettes.

What people forget about JUUL is their ‘pods’ are designed to slowly ween users off nicotine. Other e-cigarette makers promote the same type of system. I, a non-vape user, have spoken with multiple former smokers whose multi-pack habit went away once they switched to vaping. Some still vape, but the ‘juice’ is mostly nicotine free.

The naysayers will point towards last year’s illnesses from people who used vaping devices. It’s important to realize these do not involve JUUL products but from a company called “Dank Vapes” which uses an over-abundance of Vitamin E. Guess what Inverse.com discovered in their exposé on “Dank Vapes”? It’s not a real company!

Dank Vapes has a logo. You can buy Dank Vapes T-shirts. Sales of Dank Vapes products can be easily spotted on Twitter or Instagram or Medium. Inverse has reached out to government agencies, accounts claiming to sell Dank Vapes, cannabis labs, and members of the cannabis industry.

They all seem to tell a similar story — that Dank Vapes may be fake. It’s a black-market “brand” that has inspired loyalty online but comes with serious risks.

“They act like a cannabis company, but they actually don’t exist. They’re in the packaging industry,” Mark Hoashi, founder of the Doja app, which is “Yelp for the cannabis industry,” tells Inverse.

“These are just people filling cartridges as ‘Dank Vapes.’ It’s not a singular facility. It’s just people in their garages filling them and selling them.”

Of course, it’s much easier to target a large corporation with plenty of profit and attorneys than targeting the black market folks. Especially when the investigation seems more like a cash grab than anything else. It would not be surprising to see the black market expand further now that flavored vape juice is banned by the FDA (without a vote in Congress, mind you).

Another note regarding vaping and heart attacks: the Journal of the American Heart Association pulled a ‘study’ claiming vaping caused heart attacks because the research was flawed. The flaw, for those wondering, included counting ex-smokers who had heart attacks before they started vaping as vape users who had a heart attack while vaping. Can’t make this stuff up.

Vaping and e-cigarette use is a brave new world people are still attempting to figure out. However, the burgeoning market should not be something the government sinks its greedy claws into, especially under the guise of “It’s for the children!” The discovery “Dank Vapes” and the large amount of Vitamin E are the cause of the lung infection is easy to solve: people should either stop buying “Dank Vapes” or whoever is making the product should simply reduce the Vitamin E content to safer levels.

There’s no need for government involvement or a government ‘investigation’ wasting taxpayer dollars.