 The prospective publisher, the Liberty Lobby, had argued that as an "authentic" U.S. government document, the report was in the public domain.The parties settled out of court with Liberty Lobby agreeing to pay Lewin an undisclosed sum and return over a thousand unsold copies.Lewin first claimed that the report was a hoax in 1972, writing that the "Pentagon Papers" were "as outrageous, morally and intellectually" as his own satiric creation