Dr. Anthony Fauci says letting the science speak on the pandemic got him “into a little bit of trouble” during the Trump administration. President Donald Trump had called the nation’s top infectious disease expert part of a group of “idiots” and a “disaster” and suggested that he might fire Fauci after the election, which Trump ended up losing.

So, Fauci, President Biden’s chief medical adviser on COVID-19, says he rejoiced when the new president declared that “science and truth” would guide the nation’s policies on the pandemic.

“I said, ‘Hallelujah,’ you know?” Fauci told NPR’s Mary Louise Kelly on Friday.

“That’s a very liberating feeling, where people don’t have to be worried about when you’re saying something that you’re going to get pushback from your own team,” he says. “There never will be pushback on scientific data. The president himself has told us that he wants nothing but the truth based on science and good evidence.”

At a White House briefing on Thursday — his first under Biden — Fauci said that under Trump, “it was very clear that there were things that were said — be it regarding things like hydroxychloroquine and other things like that — that really was uncomfortable because they were not based on scientific fact.”

And earlier that day, Fauci said he was “honored” to announce that the United States would remain a member of the World Health Organization. That was a reversal of Trump’s move to leave the United Nations health agency. Trump had complained about the organization’s moves early in the pandemic and accused the WHO of bowing to pressure from China.