First lady Melania Trump has re-filed a libel lawsuit against the Daily Mail after the website published, then retracted, rumours she once worked as a high-end escort.

Mrs Trump had previously filed the lawsuit against Mail Media, the owner of the Daily Mail, in Maryland, but a judge earlier this month ruled the case shouldn't be filed in Maryland and dismissed it.

A lawyer for the first lady argued in a lawsuit filed on Monday that an article falsely alleging she once worked for an escort service hurt her chance to establish "multimillion-dollar business relationships" during the years in which she would be "one of the most photographed women in the world."

The suit, filed on Monday in New York State Supreme Court in Manhattan against Mail Media said the article published by the Daily Mail and its online division last August caused Mrs Trump's brand to lose "significant value" as well as "major business opportunities that were otherwise available to her." The suit noted that the article had damaged Mrs Trump's "unique, once in a lifetime opportunity" to "launch a broad-based commercial brand."