WASHINGTON - Rep. John Faso is doubling down on his push to place stricter work requirements on SNAP recipients, suggesting to audiences that the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program - the program’s formal name - is an easy target for fraudsters and drug dealers.

Sheriffs in the 19th Congressional District that Faso represents “tell me every drug dealer they arrest has a SNAP card in his pocket,” Faso said last week at an Ulster County Republican brunch in Kingston.

Drug dealers aren’t “declaring any income,” Faso said, evoking scattered snickers in the audience. “That’s a lot of what’s going on.”

But the video, captured by an opposition-research “tracker” for a Democratic Super PAC, American Bridge, is hardly a “gotcha” moment.

Faso, a first-term Republican from Kinderhook facing mounting Democratic opposition, said much the same thing in an interview with the Times Union earlier this month.

He referred to it in an explanation of why he’s spearheading a Republican push on Capitol Hill to bolster work requirements for the millions of “able-bodied” recipients in a program that subsidizes food purchases for 42.2 million nationwide — almost three million in New York state.

In a follow-up interview, Faso insisted his emphasis on SNAP fraud and drug-dealer use was simply an illustration of how a well-intentioned program has to some degree gone off kilter, and how expanded work requirements would lessen dependence on government.

“I’m not contending it’s a major part of the expenditure” for SNAP, Faso said. “But I do think it’s our responsibility as stewards of government to safeguard taxpayer dollars. That’s what my constituents would expect me to do.”

But SNAP experts, advocates and several of Faso’s potential Democratic opponents say the 65-year-old former state Assembly minority leader is playing to his conservative Republican base in the purplish Hudson Valley-Catskills district at the expense of vulnerable low-income families and individuals.

“Exploiting small examples of bad actors is right out of the Donald Trump playbook,” said Brian Flynn, 48, of Hunter, one of seven Democratic Faso opponents to declare their intentions of running so far. “His response is to blame other people - ‘they’re taking something from you’ - rather than doing something to help all people.”

Flynn added: “It’s not even a dog whistle. It’s blatant racism.”

In Faso’s district, 88 percent of SNAP recipients are white, according to data from the U.S. Department of Agriculture, which administers the program.

But statewide, about 60 percent of SNAP recipients live in New York City, where whites are a minority.

Faso emphatically denied he is a racist. “That’s not the tenor or tone in which I discussed this topic,” he said. Accusing him of racism, he said, is “a dog whistle for the left.”

Since his initial election in 2016, Faso has characterized himself as “center-right.” He has navigated a political course that sometimes puts him at odds with Republican congressional leaders and President Donald Trump.

But as the sole New York Republican on the House Agriculture Committee, Faso finds himself in ideological lockstep with Republicans pushing forward on this year’s Farm Bill.

In reauthorizing SNAP (among other things), the GOP bill stiffens work requirements for so-called “Able-Bodied Adults without Dependents” - ABAWDs or, sometimes, ABODs - who are neither elderly, disabled nor the sole parent of young children.

Nevin Cohen, a City University of New York health policy professor who studies SNAP, said Faso and other Republicans are perpetuating myths about SNAP. Among the able-bodied who get SNAP, 75 percent work or are between jobs.

“The vast majority have children or elderly relatives at home, or they have one or two breadwinners who work in low-wage jobs,” he said. “They are poor.”

Cohen cited studies showing that every federally funded SNAP dollar generates $1.79 in economic benefits to a community for every dollar spent on groceries, and that every $1 billion spent on SNAP produces close to 10,000 jobs.

A report last month by the non-partisan Congressional Research Service said fraud in the program is “rare” and that such cases “represent a relatively small fraction of SNAP overall.”

About 1.5 percent of all SNAP benefits were “trafficked,” the report said. Trafficking in SNAP puts store owners in collusion with recipients to illegally give them cash and still recoup federal dollars for bogus food purchases.

The report also found that unintentional error accounted for 45 percent of claims by states and localities against SNAP recipients. Three percent were due to outright fraud.

In New York, the nation’s fourth largest user of SNAP funds ($4.9 billion), there were 2,428 SNAP disqualifications - either through prosecution or consent agreement - with a dollar value of $2.4 million.

Faso’s office pointed to a series of six recent benefit-fraud cases investigated by the Ulster County Sheriff’s Office, only four of which actually involved SNAP.

Among them are a Kerhonkson man and a Poughkeepsie woman who used SNAP benefit cards not belonging to them and a Kingston woman who hid her true household income in order to obtain a card.

Faso’s office cited four drug-arrest cases in which sheriff’s deputies found SNAP cards. Among them was a 2016 Delaware County sheriff’s arrest of seven for operating a clandestine methamphetamine laboratory.

In Albany, Sheriff Craig Apple said he knew of no drug-related arrests in which dealers possessed SNAP cards. But he did say the Albany County Department of Social Services employs five retired law enforcement officers who investigate SNAP-fraud cases.

According to sheriff’s office data, deputies arrested 281 for benefits fraud over the past 10 years, with a dollar value of nearly $2.4 million.

“There is tons of fraud,” said Apple, a Democrat. “But in today’s political climate, people are afraid to touch it.”

Whether broadsides involving SNAP represent good politics for Faso likely will be determined at the polls this November. SNAP is not the only issue on voters’ minds, but opponents are quick to exploit what they see as a potential vulnerability.

“We should be fighting to help folks that are struggling, not making it harder for them,” said Pat Ryan of Gardiner in Ulster County, another of Faso’s potential Democratic opponents.

But Rep. Steve Stivers of Ohio, who heads the National Republican Congressional Committee - with overall responsibility for electing GOP House members - said that although 2018 is a challenging election year for Republicans, he is not worried about Faso.

“I feel very confident that John Faso will be back here,” he said at a Capitol Hill meeting of regional reporters.