one of the things i find interesting is how facts become facts because they're in a newspaper as opposed to the record. >> all right. that was labor secretary al alexander acosta trying to defend his judgment on the plea deal he made with jeffrey epstein a decade ago. joining us now is julie k. brown. her investigative work at the miami herald has led to major breaks in this epstein case. julie, great to have you here. you are the sort of foremost authority on -- because you've looked back at the records -- on what went down. so when he talked about the history of this case yesterday in that press conference, was he telling the truth? >> well, he -- i guess that's the truth the way he looks at it. but it doesn't square with what