If I understand correctly (and information is both sketchy and politicized, so I may well not), the US had defective kits (kits that were giving incorrect results). Kits that worked were only available in very limited numbers, if at all.
One of the USA's biggest failures in this crisis is how they somehow managed to make the pandemic a poltical problem. Now they have divided their nation so that now half of the population believes its a hoax
What's interesting to me is that while the divide may be somewhat along pro/anti Trump lines, I've met people on both sides of the Trump issue who believe that current social distancing measures for Covid-19 are much to extreme given the economic costs.
Yes, some of the kits had faulty negative controls. This article is about a lab that developed their own test for their own research on respiratory disease spread though. They didn't use the CDC's tests or the CDC's protocol and that's why they received a cease and desist even though they've probably saved many lives not only in Washington but throughout the country by getting people to see the magnitude of the problem.