WASHINGTON—State attorneys general and internet activists filed legal challenges to the Federal Communications Commission’s recent rollback of Obama-era internet regulations, launching a legal battle that could go on for years.

New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman and more than 20 other officials filed their combined petition in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit.

The appeal alleges the FCC’s December rollback of so-called net-neutrality rules was “arbitrary and capricious” and failed to justify the abrupt turnaround, given the government’s longstanding support for the policy, according to a release. The challenge also says the new FCC order improperly pre-empted state and local efforts to impose net-neutrality rules on internet service providers.

The FCC didn’t immediately comment on the suits. FCC Chairman Ajit Pai, a Republican, has argued that the Obama-era net-neutrality rules were hurting investment in broadband infrastructure. Republicans on the FCC also have criticized many of the Obama-era rules as government overreach.

The open-internet rules require internet service providers such as Comcast Corp., AT&T Inc. and Verizon Communications Inc. to treat all traffic equally. The rules were strongly supported by internet companies such as Facebook Inc. and Alphabet Inc.’s Google unit.