Former Vice President Joseph R. Biden says he is “center-left,” pushing back against the far-left visions of some of his 2020 presidential rivals and liberal firebrands such as Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.

“The vast majority of Democrats are where I am on the issues,” he said in an interview that aired Friday on CNN. “I am center-left.”

“Look, it’s center-left, that’s where I am,” he said of the Democratic party. “Where it’s not is way left.”

He said he wished he had been labeled a moderate when he was running for office in Delaware.

Mr. Biden has eschewed calls for a universal “Medicare for All” health care plan, but said there should be a public health care option people could choose to purchase.

“If they like their employer-based insurance, which a lot of unions broke their neck to get … they shouldn’t have to give it up,” he said. “The flip of it is, if you don’t go my way and you go their way, you have to give up all [of] that.”

“And what’s going to happen when you have 300 million people landing on a health care plan? How long is that going to take? What’s it going to do? And in the meantime, a lot of people are going to be in trouble,” he said.

He also called Ms. Ocasio-Cortez of New York a “brilliant, bright woman.”

“But she won a primary,” he said. “In the general election fights, who won? Mainstream Democrats who are very progressive on social issues and very strong on education, health care.”

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