House GOP candidate praised as an upcoming ‘star’ by Trump, posts photo of herself holding a gun next to images of ‘Squad’ members

'Posting a photo with an assault rifle next to the faces of three women of colour is not advertising. It’s incitement'

Marjorie Taylor Greene, conservative Republican candidate for Georgia's 14th congressional district, has caused outrage online by posting an image on Facebook in which she stands holding a firearm next to images of the “Squad” — representatives Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, Rashida Tlaib, and Ilhan Omar.

Ms Greene describes herself in her Twitter bio as “Christian, Wife, Mom, Small Business Owner, Proud American, 100% Pro-Life, Pro-Gun, Pro-Trump, #MAGA”.

The image has now either been deleted or made private on the platform, but the accompanying post remains.

It reads: “Hate America leftists want to take this country down ... Politicians have failed this country. I’m tired of seeing weak, Establishment Republicans play defense.

“Our country is on the line. America needs fighters who speak the truth. We need strong conservative Christians to go on the offence against these socialists who want to rip our country apart.”

A red bar at the foot of the image reads "Squad's Worst Nightmare".

The post was described as "a threatening message to three lawmakers by an incoming member of the House".

Representative Omar responded on Twitter: "Posting a photo with an assault rifle next to the faces of three women of colour is not advertising. It’s incitement. There are already death threats in response to this post. Facebook should remove this violent provocation."

In another similar post on Thursday evening, the prospective GOP House member used an image of her riding a horse under pictures of the same three squad members plus representative Ayanna Pressley, with the words: "These radical women scare some Republicans, but they don't scare this American woman. Stop the socialist squad!"

President Donald Trump endorsed Ms Greene, a QAnon conspiracy theorist, after she won her congressional primary, calling her a "future Republican star" who is "strong on everything and never gives up".

She will replace retiring incumbent Tom Graves in what is considered to be a safe Republican seat.

A number of videos uploaded to Facebook by Ms Greene show her making racist, Islamophobic and anti-Semitic remarks, such as claiming that African Americans are “slaves to the Democratic Party”.

She also suggested that Muslims should not work in government and claimed that Democratic donor George Soros, who is subject to numerous anti-Semitic conspiracy theories, is a Nazi.

Her Democrat opponent in November is Kevin Van Ausdal. His campaign page states: "Northwest Georgia doesn’t need someone who is looking to make themselves a twitter personality, who traffics in conspiracy theories and has every excuse to avoid taking responsibility when they are shown how wrong and how toxic they are."