A coalition of 24 states, alongside a dozen cities and counties, has sued the Trump administration over its decision to revoke the bedrock scientific determination underpinning virtually all US climate regulations.

The new lawsuit, filed in the US Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia on Thursday, is being led by the states of Massachusetts, California, New York and Connecticut. It argues that the Environmental Protection Agency’s February rescission of the 2009 endangerment finding – which the White House described as the “single largest deregulatory action in US history” – was illegal.

“When the federal government abandons the law and the science, everyday people suffer the consequences,” Andrea Joy Campbell, the Massachusetts attorney general, said in an emailed statement.

The lawsuit seeks to reinstate the endangerment finding, which found that greenhouse gases threaten public health and welfare, and formed the basis for climate standards on cars, power plants, and other sources of greenhouse gas pollution. It also aims to reverse a related move from the EPA to repeal all limits on standards for planet-warming emissions from motor vehicles.

“Across our country, communities are already suffering from climate disasters. From freak storms to devastating floods to deadly cold snaps and unbearable heat waves, the climate crisis is here, and it is already reshaping the way we live,” said the New York attorney general Letitia James in a statement. “Instead of helping Americans face our new reality, the Trump administration has chosen denial, repealing critical protections that are foundational to the federal government’s response to climate change.”

The court may consolidate the new case with another lawsuit filed by environmental groups in February.

When repealing the endangerment finding, the EPA claimed that the US Clean Air Act does not apply to carbon dioxide and other planet-warming pollutants. The law is only meant to regulate pollution “that harms health or the environment through local and regional exposure”, the agency argued.

But scientists have for decades warned that greenhouse-gas emissions are warming the planet and thereby intensifying dangerous extreme weather events, harming air quality, allowing the rapid spread of disease, and worsening illnesses from allergies to malaria.

“As a physician, I see the consequences of climate change and air pollution first-hand: growing numbers of hospitalizations during summer heat waves, asthma attacks triggered by wildfire smoke, and patients uprooted by floods and hurricanes,” said Anna Goldman, a primary care physician, who serves as medical director of climate and sustainability at Boston Medical Center.

“The EPA’s rescission of the Endangerment Finding poses a direct threat to the health of all Americans. Rather than shielding our communities from the harms of air pollution and climate change, this action will directly cause disease and premature death across our country.”

In a statement, an EPA spokesperson said the agency “carefully considered and re-evaluated” the endangerment finding, the 1970 Clean Air Act, and subsequent legal decisions and concluded that the agency does not have “statutory authority to prescribe motor vehicle emission standards for the purpose of addressing global climate change concerns”.

“In the absence of such authority, the endangerment finding is not valid, and EPA cannot retain the regulations that resulted from it,” the spokesperson said.

The endangerment finding has been repeatedly affirmed and upheld amid previous challenges.