Anthony S. Fauci, the country’s top infectious disease expert, said Thursday on CNN that he thinks the entire country should be under stay-at-home orders.

“If you look at what’s going on in this country, I just don’t understand why we’re not doing that,” he told the network’s Anderson Cooper. “We really should be.”

Cooper had asked Fauci, who’s quickly become a familiar face as he advises on the White House’s coronavirus response, if it makes sense to him that some states have yet to issue stay-at-home orders.

“I mean, whether there should be a federally mandated directive for that or not — I guess that’s more of a political question — but just scientifically, doesn’t everybody have to be on the same page with this stuff?” Anderson asked.

Fauci agreed, though he said he did not want to “get into” the “tension” between a federal mandate and states’ rights.

President Trump maintained at Thursday’s coronavirus task force briefing that he would leave the decision about stay-at-home orders up to the states, rather than issue a blanket national one. He argued that many states have issued such policies on their own and many have kept the spread of covid-19 low.

Deborah Birx, the doctor coordinating the task force, urged Americans Thursday to do more social distancing — to which Trump countered that Americans should be “thrilled” with how well most states had done at keeping their case counts down.

Fauci also said on CNN that it’s “not a bad idea” for people to wear face coverings in public, as the White House is expected to advise in a reversal. He said the issue is “being discussed really very actively” and will be on the coronavirus task force’s agenda Friday.