while Fauci advocated for wearing facial coverings in public. Fauci's shifting advice on wearing face masks drew criticism, which Fauci responded to by arguing that changes in policy were necessary as scientists learned more about COVID-19. In mid-April, when asked about social distancing and stay-at-home measures, Fauci said that if the administration had "started mitigation earlier" more lives could have been saved, and "no one is going to deny that." He added that the decision-making for implementing mitigation measures was "complicated", and "there was a lot of pushback about shutting things down back then." Fauci's comments were met with a hostile response from former Republican congressional candidate DeAnna Lorraine. Trump retweeted Lorraine's response, which included the call to "#FireFauci.” "Fire Fauci" has also been chanted by anti-lockdown protesters in various locations, including Florida and Texas. As a result, the White House denied that Trump was firing Fauci, and blamed the media for overreacting. Due to Trump's opposition to CDC mask wearing guidelines and social distancing measures, which Fauci advocated, Fauci was criticized by right-wing pundits and received death threats that necessitated a security detail. In an interview with 60 Minutes in 2020, he mentioned that other members of his family, including his wife and daughters, had been repeatedly harassed since the pandemic began. In June 2020, Fauci said that he was "very concerned" that the ongoing protests against police brutality would cause "surges" in COVID-19 cases, stating that the "large crowds" are a "perfect set-up" for the virus to spread. In July 2020, Fauci advised the public to "avoid crowds of any type". On July 6, 2020, Fauci spoke on a Facebook livestream, offering his opinion that the country's situation pertaining to COVID-19 "is really not good", pointing to more than 55,000 new cases on July 4, 2020. He said the United States was "still knee-deep in the first wave" of cases, and was experiencing a "resurgence of infections". On July 7, 2020, during a press conference, Fauci stated that it was a "false narrative to take comfort in a lower rate of death" for COVID-19 in the country: "There's so many other things that are very dangerous and bad about this virus, don't get yourself into false complacency." Both Trump and the White House had cited the falling death rate as proof of success of the Trump administration's response. After this appearance by Fauci, the White House cancelled three