praising his work at the labor department privately and downplaying the role that he had in jeffrey epstein's plea deal. after alex acosta came out, the reaction was essentially mixed. some people said it wasn't as bad as they thought it was going to be initially, but then the president started hearing criticism from people over how he conducted himself, how he hadn't offered an explicit apology to the victims in that plea deal situation. the president essentially started to change his tone on him and started asking people about other potential leaders at the labor department and pointing to certain parts of the plea deal that came under scrutiny, including the part where the victims were not told about it until it had been approved by a judge. that is what led to the president essentially losing his confidence. because the president had not publicly praised acosta's performance, a lot of people in the west wing essentially saw the writing on the wall last night and didn't think that he would be in the cabinet much longer. >> all right, kaitlin collins on the north lawn of the white house, thanks very much. now, of course acosta is just the latest top official to leave the trump administration