Laura Ingraham’s Fox News show got smoked by an employee of bro blog Barstool Sports who trolled his way through a segment on the dangers of vaping by blowing puffs of smoke, joking and coughing.
Tom Scibelli, who also goes by the name Tommy Smokes, appeared on “The Ingraham Angle” Thursday night wearing a “Vape God” hat and touting his love for the electronic cigarette Juul.
“There’s nothing cooler than blowing a fat cloud like that,” Scibelli, 22, said as he exhaled. “They call me the ‘Colossus of Cloud.’ It helps my swag. It helps my drip. I just love walking around. It’s really good for getting chicks, too. I started about a year ago and haven’t looked back since.”
The Food and Drug Administration, alarmed at the growing public health menace of young people using e-cigarettes like Juul, threatened in September to ban the devices. The regulator on Thursday backed down, but said e-cigarette sellers had to keep them in areas inaccessible to teenagers.
Scibelli told HuffPost he was invited on Ingraham’s show by producers who told him they saw his Barstool Sports Juul tricks video on Instagram and wanted him “to represent the youth in a debate about the art of vaping.”
The anti-vape view was represented by Dr. Janette Nesheiwat, who listed health risks that can eventually put users on oxygen tanks to breathe. As she spoke, Scibelli deeply inhaled, coughed, and hit two Juuls at once.
“Tommy is over there gasping for air,” Nesheiwat pointed out.
“It’s a sign of strength,” responded Scibelli. “Cigarettes are bad for you. I would never do anything that’s bad for your lungs or anything. I just stick to Juul.”
When Nesheiwat mentioned the possibility of e-cigarette-induced “popcorn lung” from scarring and inflammation, Scibelli interrupted. “Ah, I love popcorn,” he said. “Popcorn’s delicious!”
Ingraham closed the show by saying: “We’re going to check in with Tommy Smokes in about six years and see how he’s doing.”
Scibelli said he hopes his appearance “proved to her that vaping is a lifestyle.”
He tweeted about the experience after the show, saying he overheard someone ask if anyone did research on him before inviting him. He also said a producer told him to stop vaping on air.
“I didn’t stop,” he wrote.
