Dr. Anthony Fauci, the federal government’s top infectious disease expert, says the politicization of the coronavirus was a key contributor to the U.S. death toll now surpassing 500,000. 

In an interview with CNN’s “New Day” on Tuesday morning, Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, took particular aim at states that moved to reopen their economies ahead of federal recommendations and people who denied that the virus was a serious threat.

“It’s like people on a crew team rowing in the same direction. You can’t have disparate responses,” Fauci said. “When you have such a common force, such a powerful force against you — this virus that’s exerted such a toll on us — you’ve got to do it together in a unified way and not have any kind of political-ideology divisiveness getting in the way of what we’re trying to do.” 

While not naming names, he said it was not helpful that while public health officials were calling for a uniformed, phased-in approach to reopening the economy, elected leaders ignored the recommendations and suggested their areas were “in good shape,” leading to some residents not following guidelines such as mask wearing and social distancing.

“I still have flashing in my mind those scenes of when we were trying to tell people to really be careful and avoid congregate settings and you used to see on television at night people crowded at bars — inside, no masks,” Fauci said. “I mean, that was just asking for trouble. And in fact, that’s what we got — a lot of trouble.”

Fauci said it was “self-evident” that former President Donald Trump contributed to the mixed messaging.

Fauci also said he found it especially troubling to see people who were skeptical about how dangerous the virus was.

“One of the things that I think, if I go through the multiple things that were actually painful for me, was when there were situations where there were hospitals that were almost overrun, where you were having 20 ICU beds in a particular hospital and 50 people who needed ICU care, and in those same regions there were people who were denying that this was going on, saying, ‘Oh, it’s fake news, it’s a hoax,’” Faucis said. “I mean, how could you possibly say that when people in your own state, your own city, your own county are dying?"

The U.S. has recorded nearly 28.2 million coronavirus cases, and it eclipsed the half-million mark for deaths Monday. The country accounts for about 4.2% of the world’s population, but makes up 25.2% of all coronavirus cases and 20.2% of deaths, according to data from Johns Hopkins University hospital.