COLUMBIA, S.C. – South Carolina Attorney General Alan Wilson announced Friday that the State secured $70,453,028.48 in its share of the annual tobacco Master Settlement Agreement (“MSA”) Payment.
In 1998, the Attorney General’s Office joined 45 other States, the District of Columbia, and five U.S. territories in settling claims with the then four major U.S. cigarette manufacturers. The MSA is the largest financial recovery in legal history. Since the MSA was signed in November 1998, about 50 other tobacco companies have signed onto the MSA and are also bound by its terms. The settlement imposes major restrictions on the industry’s advertising and marketing, and it provides states with annual payments in perpetuity to help reimburse the states for healthcare costs and harm caused by tobacco use. South Carolina’s payment primarily goes to the S.C. Department of Health and Human Services for the Medicaid program.
The Attorney General is tasked with enforcing the tobacco statutes that were enacted pursuant to the MSA and works with the attorneys general across the country to actively and successfully enforce the provisions of the MSA.
Since 1998, South Carolina has received a total of $1,984,561,831.17 in its share of tobacco MSA payments.
