INDIANAPOLIS (AP) - A federal court has struck down a major portion of Indiana's restrictive vaping law that created a monopoly for one security firm and sparked an FBI probe.
The Seventh U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Chicago ruled Monday that the law violated the Constitution's commerce clause by imposing excessive regulations on out-of-state companies.
Lafayette-based Mulhaupt's Inc. was the only company that was qualified to handle industry security permitting for producers under the state's law. The company approved only six companies to produce.
The ruling applies only to out-of-state companies that manufacture "e-liquid" used in vaping devices.
The court wrote that Indiana's law "looks very much like a legislative grant of a monopoly to one favored in-state company in the security business."
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