Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell on Monday introduced a bill to raise the federal age for purchasing tobacco products, including e-cigarettes, to 21, increasing the chances that Congress will clear a significant smoking-related bill for the first time since a major tobacco control law was enacted a decade ago.

The bill comes amid growing concerns about the youth use of e-cigarettes, which reached record levels in 2018. That marked a troubling reversal of declines in smoking traditional cigarettes.

Those worrisome trends prompted McConnell to introduce the bill, despite the important role that tobacco farming plays in the economy of his home state Kentucky, he said in a Senate floor speech Monday.

“I recognize that I might seem like an unusual candidate to lead this charge,” he said. But he argued that Kentucky farmers had the same interest as anyone else in making sure their children don’t become addicted to nicotine. “Youth vaping is a public health crisis,” he said.

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