Cigar Aficionado

Last year, cigarmaker E.P. Carrillo released Pledge of Allegiance, a limited-edition cigar that combined the names of the company’s Pledge and Allegiance lines and also celebrated the founding of the United States. Now the patriotic-themed smoke is back for a second run. Featuring red, white and blue packaging, the star-spangled brand is expected to start shipping to retailers in early June.

According to the cigarmaker, the original release of Pledge of Allegiance was met with such a strong response that he decided to bring it back.

“So many people reached out and wrote to me to share their own stories about America,” says brand owner Ernesto Perez-Carrillo. “This is what Pledge of Allegiance 2024 stands for.” 

Perez-Carrillo himself emigrated to the United States from Cuba, flying alone in 1959 on a PanAm plane just shy of his eighth birthday.

The Pledge of Allegiance is unchanged from last year: it’s a box-pressed Toro measuring 6 inches by 54 ring gauge, made with Connecticut broadleaf wrapper, an Ecuador Connecticut binder and mix of fillers from Nicaragua and the Dominican Republic, along with some broadleaf from Pennsylvania and Connecticut. In a Cigar Aficionado blind tasting, it rated 88 points, and was medium-full in terms of strength.

Made in the Dominican Republic at the Casa Carrillo factory, production is once again limited to 1,776 individually-numbered boxes of 10. It has a suggested retail price of $22 each (before taxes).

“The Pledge of Allegiance 2024 is not just a cigar,” he said. “It’s a representation of the American Dream that I had the privilege to live. This special blend has been crafted with a vision—to create a smoke that honors the journey every American, whether born in the U.S.A. or an immigrant, has taken or is still on.”

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