The actor is speaking out about his interview with the drug lord.
A defiant Sean Penn has broken his silence over his notorious encounter with El Chapo.
In the exclusive interview with 60 Minutesto, Penn said he has one regret about his interview with El Chapo that was published in Rolling Stone.
“I have a terrible regret. I have a regret that the entire discussion about this article ignores its purpose, which was to try to contribute to this discussion about the policy on the war on drugs,” he said. “My article failed! Let me be clear! My article failed!”
In the interview, which is set to air Sunday, the Oscar winner insisted that his contact with El Chapo did not lead Mexican military to the drug lord's hideout.
Read: Matt Damon, Oscar Isaac Come to Sean Penn's Defense After He Interviewed 'El Chapo'
“There is this myth about the visit that we made, my colleagues and I with El Chapo, that it was ‘essential to his capture.’ We had met with him many weeks earlier in a place nowhere near where he was captured,” Penn said.
Penn told Charlie Rose that the Mexican government is deliberately putting his life in danger by portraying him as the cause of El Chapo's downfall.
He claimed he interviewed El Chapo because he wanted to provoke a national debate on the war on drugs.
“I can't make him worse than me if I’m not going to do everything I can to get a conversation going on the way in which we prosecute that war,” Penn said.
Read: Newly Released Texts Show 'El Chapo' Mooning Over Actress, Unsure of Sean Penn's Identity
Actress Kate Del Castillo helped set up the interview. She also broke her silence on the meeting, after seemingly flirtatious texts that she exchanged with the drug lord were released.
The Mexican-American star wrote a lengthy note on Twitter:
— kate del castillo (@katedelcastillo) January 13, 2016
Watch Below: El Chapo Lived In Squalor Watching DVDs of Kate Del Castillo
