The tobacco industry is a major political and legal force in Florida through campaign contributions, public relations efforts, lobbying and litigation, which at least from the late 1970s, has had a centralized political organization in Florida that defends and promotes its political and economic interests at the local and state levels of government. Although the industry has operated in the open in some political campaigns, it has also operated quietly behind the scenes, often through front groups, in various other state and local political campaigns.

In Dade County in 1979, GASP of Miami ran a clean indoor air initiative without the active support of the local affiliates of the American Cancer Society, American Lung Association, and American Heart Association. Despite being outspent by the tobacco industry 90 to 1, GASP only lost by 820 votes. Had the health groups provided public and political support, the initiative may well have won, substantially increasing the momentum for clean indoor air ordinances in Florida and elsewhere.

Prior to 1985, there were numerous ongoing local efforts to pass and enact a wide variety of local clean indoor ordinances. These efforts subsided considerably after the passage of the preemption clause in the weak Florida Clean Indoor Air Act (FCIAA) of 1985 which, at first, was supported by the American Cancer Society, American Lung Association, and American Heart Association. Since the passage of FCIAA, the tobacco industry has been able to stop all efforts by the three health groups and sympathetic politicians to repeal the preemption clause.

After the passage of campaign contribution limit laws in 1991 in Florida, tobacco industry campaign contributions have been redirected away from individual candidates and to the two major political parties. In the 1993-1994 election cycle, the industry gave the largest amount of contributions with $475,000 given to the parties compared to $95,856 to political candidates. The largest contribution to a political party came from Philip Morris, which gave $382,500 to the Republican Party. These contributions in conjunction with others has reinvigorated the two major parties as political power brokers who provide their candidates with advertising, technical assistance, and paid staff.

During the 1997-1998 electoral cycle, the tobacco industry's total campaign contributions were $398,194, with $310,250 given to the two major political parties in comparison to $84,194 for legislators. The Republican Party received $227,250 compared to the Democratic Party which received $82,500. The largest contribution to a political party came from Philip Morris, which contributed $125,000 to the Republican Party.

In August 1997, Florida and the industry settled a Medicaid fraud lawsuit. Under the terms of the settlement, the industry agreed to pay Florida $11.3 billion, end outdoor billboards, pay for public anti-tobacco campaigns, remove vending machines from places accessible to children, end tobacco advertising on buses and trains, complete an anti-tobacco youth campaign within two years of the settlement, and not name the industry in anti-tobacco ads. Due to further negotiations with the industry, on September 11, 1998, the amount paid to Florida was increased to $13 billion and restrictions on the two year time limit regarding the youth anti-smoking campaign and specifically naming the industry in anti-tobacco advertisements were lifted.

After February 1998, Florida began an effort to establish a $200 million youth anti-smoking campaign called the Tobacco Pilot Program in an effort to meet the two year deadline. The Tobacco Pilot Program has engaged in an extensive media campaign known as the "Truth Campaign" which began in late April 1998 and included tough in-your-face print, billboard, and media advertisements which ran throughout Florida. The major theme of this campaign is that Florida youth should choose "Truth" rather than use tobacco and be targets of industry advertising manipulation in the use of tobacco.

A report released on March 17, 1999 by the Florida Department of Health, Office of Tobacco Control regarding the progress of the Tobacco Pilot Program indicated that the Tobacco Pilot Program and its anti-tobacco media advertising campaign, in less than a year, had a substantial impact on influencing a significant number of Florida teens not to smoke. From February 1998 to 1999, the number of teens who were current smokers (smoked in the last 30 days) dropped from 23.3% to 20.9%. This represented 31,000 fewer Florida teenagers who were current smokers. These results represent the best results ever obtained in a large scale primary prevention program.

Although new Republican Governor Jeb Bush publicly called for the continuation of the Tobacco Pilot Program and the Truth Campaign, the program's funding was reduced from $70.5 million to $45.2 million (-36%) for the 1999-2000 Fiscal Year due to legislative votes by Republican colleagues in the House and the Senate to substantially reduce the funding of the program. These cuts were made despite public opinion polls showing that 49% of the public supported the program without any cuts and 30% supported the program with the $8.5 million cut proposed by Governor Bush. Two projects of the Tobacco Pilot Program which are crucial to maintaining the viability of the program including the Truth Campaign and administrative support for the Students Working Against Tobacco (SWAT) also received large budgetary reductions.

While the Tobacco Pilot Program received substantial funding cuts in the 1999 Legislative Session, funding for the American Heart Association's Youth Fitness Program of $3 million and $1 million for the Just The Facts program which was derived from the $45.2 million Tobacco Pilot Program budget, would have reduced the amount of funding for projects directly oriented towards tobacco control efforts to $41.2 million for 1999-2000. On May 27, 1999, Governor Bush vetoed these two diversionary projects, as well as the $2.5 million Sports for Life project which was related to tobacco control, further reducing the program's funding of projects directly related to tobacco control efforts from $70.5 million to $38.7 million (-45.1%).

For the past twenty years, a consistent pattern has emerged with respect to the American Cancer Society, the American Heart Association, and the American Lung Association missing key political opportunities that would have significantly advanced anti-tobacco efforts and public health in Florida. These lost opportunities included failing to support GASP of Miami in its 1979 Dade County clean indoor air initiative, supporting the preemption clause in the Florida Clean Indoor Air Act of 1985 which essentially quashed a blossoming grassroots anti-tobacco movement, and failing to forcefully advocate for the Tobacco Pilot Program by holding specific legislators directly and publicly accountable for the substantial funding cuts that occurred in the 1999 Legislative Session.

The tobacco industry is a major political force in Mississippi though lobbying, litigation, public relations, direct campaign contributions, indirect campaign contributions, gifts and honoraria, and entertainment events. The tobacco industry has a centralized political organization that defends and promotes its political market interests in state government. Although the tobacco industry has operated in the open in some instances, it generally works quietly behind the scenes by itself, with allied organizations, and through front groups on state political campaigns.

From 1996 to 1999, 23 legislators received tobacco industry contributions of $500 or more. Of these recipients, sixteen were Democrats and eight were Republicans. In contrast of the receipt of tobacco industry contributions, the mean tobacco score of 6.3, (standard deviation 2,2, n=20) for these legislators also indicated a mild pro-tobacco control bias.

From 1998 to 2000, Philip Morris paid its lobbyist a total of $363,574, which was the highest compensation of all tobacco lobbyists in Mississippi. The second highest compensation from 1998 to 2000 of $121,200 was received by the lobbyist for the Smokeless Tobacco Council.

Due to the continued lobbying power and presence of the tobacco lobby on state government along with anti-tax sentiments among state legislators, Mississippi’s tobacco excise tax remained the 10 th lowest in the country at 18 cents a pack.

The tobacco lobby in conjunction with business allies and a front group that it helped to establish, was able to lobby the state legislature to enact a product liability “reform” bill that substantially raised the standard to prove legal punitive damages, prohibited other retailers from being subject to lawsuits aimed at manufacturers, required a separate trial for punitive damages, and required that plaintiffs be able to seek punitive damages only after winning actual damages.

In 1994, Mississippi was the first state to file a lawsuit against the tobacco industry on behalf of taxpayers to pay for the medical costs of sick tobacco users who received Medicaid. The lawsuit was filed by Mississippi Attorney General Mike Moore in league with private attorneys including Moore’s former law school classmate and current friend attorney Richard Scruggs.

In February 1996, Republican Governor Kirk Fordice filed a private lawsuit against Mike Moore in the Mississippi Supreme Court claiming Moore’s lawsuit was illegal because Moore had failed to obtain the permission of Governor Fordice to file the lawsuit. Fordice’s lawsuit was filed at the request of a Philip Morris lobbyist and paid for in large part by the Mississippi Manufacturers’ Association. In a separate lawsuit also filed in February 1996 before the Mississippi Supreme Court, lawyers for the tobacco industry requested that Moore’s lawsuit be dismissed on the same grounds as Governor Fordice’s earlier lawsuit. In March 1997, in separate decisions, the Mississippi Supreme Court dismissed Fordice and the tobacco industry’s lawsuits.

In July 1997, the tobacco industry settled the Medicaid lawsuit with Mississippi. Under the terms of the lawsuit, $3.4 billion was to be paid to Mississippi in the first 25 years, with further payments continuing in perpetuity based on adjustments due to inflation and smoking rates.

Due to subsequent legislation in the Mississippi legislature, funds from this lawsuit were placed in a Mississippi Tobacco Trust Fund to pay for a variety of state health programs.

In October 1997, in a separate legal settlement agreement, $62 million was placed in a separate escrow account and spent over two years to establish a youth anti-tobacco program. The program has been administered by a non-profit corporation known as the Partnership for a Healthy Mississippi. Subsequent funding for the program has come from the state legislature.

Spending for the program in the first two years, which was below the $62 million placed in the escrow account, was $17 million in 1999 and $22 million in 2000. The spending in 2000 exceeded the minimum amount recommended by the CDC for the funding of the program.

The Partnership for a Healthy Mississippi administers several programs to curb youth tobacco use including community education efforts with community youth partnerships, school programs, faith-based initiatives, and targeted programs; statewide counter marketing media campaigns aimed at pre-adolescent and adolescent audiences; and surveys and evaluations.

By 2001, surveys indicated that the program was having significant effects on smoking rates. Public middle school students reporting current tobacco use (using tobacco one or more times in the last thirty days) from 1999-2001 dropping 26.7% for all tobacco use, 30.4% for cigarette use, 35.3% for cigar use, and 44.4% for smokeless tobacco use.

Due to the power of the tobacco lobby, state clean indoor legislation has remained very weak. The one major exception was a bill enacted in 2000 that prohibited tobacco use on all school property including teachers’ lounges and at athletic events. Major lobbying for this bill came from youth associated with Partnership for a Healthy Mississippi programs. Specific efforts in this campaign included two major rallies of 1000 and 1600 youth at the state capital in 2000 and individual lobbying by young people of state legislators. Technical assistance on how to properly lobby was provided by the Partnership for a Healthy Mississippi.

Although local government are not preempted from enacting stronger local clean indoor air legislation, as of 2000 no Mississippi localities have enacted major local clean indoor air legislation.

The tobacco industry is a major political force in Missouri through lobbying, direct campaign contributions, indirect contributions to the two major political parties and legislative political caucuses, gifts and honoraria, and entertainment events. The tobacco industry has a centralized political organization in Missouri that promotes and defends its political and market interests at the local and state levels of government. Although the tobacco lobby has operated in the open in some political campaigns, it has often operated quietly behind the scenes, frequently working with various allied organizations on state and local political campaigns.

* Total tobacco industry contributions in the 1991-1992 election cycle more than doubled when compared to the 1989-1990 election cycle. Since the 1991-1992 election cycle, tobacco industry contributions have declined with contributions in the 1993-1994 election cycle being nearly half of what they were in 1991-1992. In the 1995-1996 election cycle, tobacco industry contributions were a little greater than what they were in the 1991-1992 election cycle. In the 1997-1998 election cycle, tobacco industry contributions dropped to about what they were in 1991-1992.

From the 1989-1990 to the 1993-1994 electoral cycles, more direct contributions went to the Democratic Party than the Republican Party. That trend reversed in the 1995-1996 and 1997-1998 election cycles when the Republican Party received more than the Democratic Party. * Due to a political deal between the tobacco lobby and former Missouri House Speaker Bob Griffin in 1993, Missouri's tobacco excise tax rate has remained at 17 cents per pack with local governments being preempted from enacting new tobacco taxes. Missouri's tobacco excise tax rate is the ninth lowest in the country with only heavy tobacco growing states like Tennessee, Kentucky, South Carolina, North Carolina, and Virginia being lower. Higher tobacco excise taxes would significantly reduce tobacco use for all age groups in Missouri, particularly for children and poor people.

The impact of Missouri's state clean indoor air law enacted in 1992 has been very weak. Responsibility of who was to enforce the law at the local level has remained unclear. The state has not engaged in significant enforcement.

The state clean indoor air law did not preempt stricter local clean indoor air ordinances. Nevertheless, the local ordinances that did pass were weak by national standards.

Since 1993, the Missouri Department of Mental Health, Division of Alcohol and Drug Abuse has administered the Community 2000 program, a general substance abuse program that includes some tobacco control prevention efforts. The tobacco control efforts under this program have been weak due to a lack of financial and other resources. The program has not been administered in a comprehensive, effective and singular manner, and tobacco control efforts have had to compete with various other substance abuse efforts.

Since 1993, the Missouri Department of Health administered the National Cancer Institute funded antitobacco and educational American Stop Smoking Intervention Study (ASSIST) program (and its current CDC predecessor the Comprehensive State-based Tobacco Use Prevention and Control Program). Due to a lack of energetic leadership in the Department of Health to support statewide anti-tobacco educational efforts and a failure by the Department of Health to encourage legally permissible energetic local anti-tobacco education activities, the program is currently not as effective as it might be.

In 1994, the tobacco lobby in Missouri considered the Missouri Department of Mental Health to be an industry ally that would assist the industry in various political efforts. In 1996, Governor Mel Carnahan named the Missouri Department of Mental Health, Division of Alcohol and Drug Abuse to administer the federal Synar program, which required that states annually reduce the percentage of outlets likely to sell tobacco products to minors to below 20%. Administration of the Synar program occurred under the provisions of a weak 1992 state youth access law that contained very low fines for violations, voluntary enforcement by law enforcement agencies, and no licensing provisions of tobacco vendors, which made it difficult to determine which outlets sold tobacco products.

The percentage of outlets that sold tobacco products to minors dropped from 40% in 1996 to 29% in 1997. In 1998, the percentage of outlets that sold tobacco products increased to 33%. The Division of Alcohol and Drug Abuse argued that extraordinary circumstances had cause this rise including changes in sampling methodology and some law enforcement agencies placing a higher priority on enforcement efforts related to methamphetamine. On September 17, 1997, the United States Department of Health and Human Services found Missouri out of compliance with Synar enforcement and called for a fine of $9.6 million on the basis that changes in sampling methodologies and placing more emphasis on methamphetamine enforcement was the Division of Alcohol and Drug Abuse's own choice.

In the 2000 Legislative Session, the Missouri legislature allocated $1.2 million for Synar enforcement efforts to settle the complaint against it by the federal government. At the same time, the legislature also added an amendment to its appropriations bill prohibiting minors from engaging in Synar enforcement efforts. Governor Carnahan did not line item veto this provision. This amendment seriously undermined Missouri's ability to conduct Synar enforcement because the sale of tobacco to (undercover) individuals over 18 (who looked younger than 18) carried no penalty for outlets that sold these tobacco products.

Despite the fact that 20% of the annual deaths in Missouri are caused by tobacco use, the Missouri legislature failed to enact legislation to spend Master Settlement Agreement funds for tobacco control in the 2000 Legislative Session. The primary reasons for the legislation's defeat was intense opposition by some Democrats and Republicans to any tobacco control program and the House sponsors of the bill lost control of the legislative process in the middle of the Session.

Even if the Master Settlement Agreement bill had passed in the 2000 Legislative Session, its future effectiveness was in doubt because the bill called for the historically pro-tobacco Department of Mental Health to administer the program and a Senate provision allowed tobacco control funds to be diverted to other substance abuse programs.

Organized health groups and advocates in Missouri are currently weak due to reorganization and a lack of resources. The health groups are also taking a strictly insider lobbying approach to tobacco control advocacy, not wanting to hold specific politicians publicly accountable for their pro-tobacco and anti-public health actions with outsider actions such as litigation or newspaper advertisements. Until this approach changes and the health groups are willing to increase resources to tobacco control activities, health advocates are highly unlikely to alter the current pro-tobacco orientation of the state legislature.

Health advocates could successfully advance tobacco control efforts in Missouri by conducting a vigorous campaign to enact local tobacco control ordinances.

The tobacco industry remains a powerful force in California politics through lobbying, campaign contributions, public relations, and litigation tactics.

The tobacco industry spent $4.6 million on state level political activity in California during the 1999-2000 election cycle, including $2,234,707 on campaign contributions and $2,427,907 million on lobbying. This is an increased of about 6% ($300,000) compared to the previous election cycle.

Tobacco industry campaign contributions to legislators and legislative candidates, state constitutional officers, political parties, and party controlled committees totaled $1,470,611, a 173% increase compared to $848,635 in 1997-1998, and about the same as the $1,519,624 in 1995-1996, $1,489,904 in 1993-1994.

The tobacco industry continues to favor Republicans over Democrats in making campaign contributions, although the gap is narrowing. In 1999-2000, 58% of campaign contributions went to Republican candidates and committees, down from 81% in 1997-1998.

The largest recipients of tobacco industry campaign contributions in 1999-2000 were Assembly member Scott Baugh (R-Huntington Beach) $90,000; and Senator Ross Johnson (R-Irvine) $83,000.

The tobacco industry continues to make more campaign contributions to members of the California Legislature than to members of Congress ($10,376 per member of the California Legislature compared to $4,486 per member of Congress). The top recipient of tobacco industry campaign contributions in Congress, Senator Conrad Burns (R-MT), received $34,500, compared to the $90,000 the top Californian recipient received.

Of the 120 members of the Legislature, 33 members accepted no campaign contributions from the tobacco industry (31 Democrats, 1 Republican, and 1 Independent); in 1997-1998, 28 members accepted no campaign contributions from the tobacco industry.

The tobacco industry spent $2,592,907 on lobbying expenditures in the 1999-2000 legislative cycle, almost one million less than it spent in the 1997-1998 cycle.

Despite initial optimism that the Davis Administration would reverse the relentless efforts by Pete Wilson’s Administration to undermine and weaken tobacco control efforts, the Davis Administration has opposed substantial increases in funding for tobacco control.

After political pressure from organized health groups, Davis did reverse the Wilson-era policy forbidding media attacks on the tobacco industry. However, Davis was slow to change the cumbersome approval process that Wilson put in place to stifle the program. This situation was aggravated by the sluggishness in appointing new staff members to his administration.

Two health groups – the American Heart Association and Americans for Nonsmokers’r Rights – have challenged Governor Davis to reduce smoking prevalence in California to 10% in 5 years; they estimate that this action will prevent 50,000 heart disease deaths.

Starting in the second year of the Davis Administration, a media campaign by organized health groups focused on pressuring the Administration to begin spending tobacco settlement funds on tobacco control. In 2001, the Davis Administration announced that it would spend from tobacco settlement funds a modest amount of $20 million on a youth anti-smoking program. This is well below the $105 million (20% of the tobacco settlement) that health groups, the state Tobacco Education and Research Oversight Committee, and the federal CDC recommended.

The Davis Administration has maintained other aspects of the tobacco control program (such as local programs and competitive grants) at the reduced levels established during the Wilson Administration.

During the earlier 1990s, when the California Tobacco Control Program was large and aggressive, smoking was falling in California much more rapidly than in the rest of the United States. This reduction in smoking was credited with preventing 59,000 heart disease deaths from 1989 through 1997. During the later 1990s, after the program was cut back and toned down, this difference narrowed; this effect was associated with 15,000 more heart disease deaths than would have occurred had program effectiveness been maintained.

Since Proposition 10 raised the cigarette tax 50 cents in 1999, smoking has been falling faster in California than the rest of the country.

By February 2001, only thirteen of 62 California local governments that had received $500 million in tobacco settlement funds had allocated any funds for tobacco control efforts. The combined spending of the thirteen counties that did spend funds on tobacco control was about $16.8 million.

On August 21, 2000, a bill to pass fire-safe cigarette legislation was killed in the Assembly Committee on Governmental Organization, which has traditionally been recognized to be sympathetic to tobacco industry positions.

Proposition 37, which would have overturned the court decision of Sinclair Paint vs. State Board of Equalization that found that mitigation fees for polluting or contaminated products (such as the tobacco industry’s products) was defeated in November 2000. Philip Morris was the top contributor to Yes on 37 campaign to overturn the Sinclair decision, contributing $350,000; with the entire tobacco industry contributing $668,000 out of the $2,555,620 spent on the Yes on 37 campaign.

Master Settlement Agreement enforcement by California Attorney General Bill Lockyer’s office resulted in an agreement in 1999 by the R. J. Reynolds Company to restrict the display of advertising and promotional items at booths at auto racing events. In 2000, United States Tobacco agreed not to distribute tobacco coupons in any free newspaper in any university in California. Also in 2000, R.J. Reynolds agreed to mail cigarette samples only to adults and only after they had given prior consent.

While some progress has been made on reversing the setbacks for tobacco control during the Wilson era, particularly because the voters have continued to support increased tobacco taxes, California has not regained the position of world leadership on tobacco control it held in the early 1990s. The program is stalled and adrift. As a result, thousands of people are dying and will die unnecessarily.

The tobacco industry is a major political force in Oklahoma through lobbying, direct campaign contributions, indirect contributions to the two major political parties and legislative political caucuses, and gifts and entertainment events. The tobacco industry has a centralized political organization in Oklahoma that promotes and defends its political and market interests at the local and state levels of government. Although the tobacco industry has operated in the open in some political campaigns, it has often operated quietly behind the scenes, frequently working with various allied organizations on state and local political campaigns.