Republicans on the campaign trail have long bashed President Barack Obama’s environmental regulations. This week the battle moves to the courtroom, where several industries and GOP lawmakers are trying to overturn the administration’s rules for reducing greenhouse gases.

Industry groups, including those representing chemical, energy, farming and mining interests, have brought several challenges to the Environmental Protection Agency’s first-ever rules limiting carbon-dioxide emissions.
In the lead case, the plaintiffs are challenging the EPA’s finding that such greenhouse gases endanger public health and welfare. That finding formed the basis for agency rules that imposed greenhouse-gas-emissions standards on cars beginning with the 2012 model year and set initial rules on permits for power plants and factories.

Beginning Tuesday, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit will hear two days of arguments on that case and three others involving challenges to those rules. The court often is considered the second most influential in the U.S. after the Supreme Court.