AWMA joined with other members of the Coalition to Stop Contraband Tobacco in sending a strongly worded letter to all 100 members of the U.S. Senate urging them to promptly pass legislation – S. 1147 – known as the Prevent All Cigarette Trafficking Act or PACT Act.

Along with spearheading this coalition dedicated to enacting the PACT Act, AWMA recently sent a Legislative Alert to our members requesting their help in sending letters to their legislators on this important issue.  AWMA has a pre-written letter on our Web site at www.awmanet.org that members can use to contact their lawmakers to urge them to act on this legislation.  

Passage of the PACT Act is critical to ensuring fairness in cigarette and smokeless tobacco retail.  Current federal law is simply not strong enough to prevent tax-evading Internet sales of these tobacco products.  Legitimate, responsible distributors and retailers sell these products in compliance with all tax laws.  Unfortunately, these illegal Internet sellers do not, and many of these Internet websites offer cigarettes without paying any state and local taxes at all – giving them a tremendous competitive advantage.  Additionally, many of these tobacco products sold via the Internet end up in the hands of minors because of a lack of age-verification inherent in these types of sales.

While the U.S. House of Representatives has already passed the PACT Act, the full Senate has yet to act and AWMA is working to put pressure on that body to promote passage of this important legislation.  Thank you for your support for this action!