MATT BERMAN: At the start of this election season, you were Kamala Harris' communications director. What's the beset argument for her to be Biden's VP? LILY ADAMS: I knew it would be a veep question! MATT BERMAN: Haha we are obvious I guess.

LILY ADAMS: My biases are well know so at the top I'll say Biden should get the space to pick who he wants -- it's really one of the only decisions he gets to fully make. But there have been few as effective as Kamala at holding Trump, his nominees & cabinet officials accountable. One of the main roles of a VP pick is usually to do some slicing and dicing of the opponent and I think she's more than shown her mettle. She's got great raw political talent, long record of experience but more than any of that, she's a committed public servant and a good person, so an Administration would be lucky to have her in the #2 slot.

THE LEDE

It is about to get warm outside in much of the US. This is normally a good thing, unless you are a sadist. But this summer is going to be radically different, with areas across the country trying to figure out how to reopen as the coronavirus continues to spread.

This leaves many politicians in an unprecedented bind. That’s especially true for mayors and local leaders in dense areas, where asking people to stay in their homes is often asking them to risk sweltering heat. If you’re New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio (and congrats on your job and height), the choice you have is abysmal: Do you risk crowding in city parks and beaches, or do you try and force people inside, where many lack access to air conditioning and are at risk of heatstroke? De Blasio’s answer so far has been a little of each: raising the potential of limiting park access while relenting to opening up more roads to pedestrians.

Inequality has been the political story of the pandemic. The same people who have been disproportionately hit by the coronavirus — people who can’t afford steep utility bills — could now face a grueling summer inside.

And: Let’s be clear, the best political event of this week was Maria DeCotis’s absolutely stellar interpretation of New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s recent monologue about his daughter’s new boyfriend.

READ RECEIPTS

Texting with Lily Adams

Lily Adams is Democratic strategist with deep experience across recent presidential campaigns ⁠— she was a top communications aide on Hillary Clinton’s 2016 campaign, the communications director on Sen. Kamala Harris’s 2020 campaign, and is now chief communications officer for Unite the Country, a super PAC backing Joe Biden. We texted late Thursday afternoon about the campaign and this whole bad/weird time.

LILY ADAMS: Okay! I'm ready. Fire away (whenever you're ready). MATT BERMAN: Great! I am ready. So, as a contractual obligation, I have to begin this conversation by asking you to send us a selfie of what you're up. IMAGE DESCRIPTION: Selfie of Lily Adams in front of a home bar.

MATT BERMAN: That's great to hear. And yeah, too many over-achievers out there with their new languages. A source with knowledge of your quarantine tells me that you've developed a detailed rundown of Alison Roman recipes. What are we, as a society, getting wrong about Alison Roman recipes? LILY ADAMS: The people have questions, I've got answers (or at least opinions). My hottest take is that the lemon turmeric cake is really overrated but people make it because it looks lovely on instagram -- instead people should make her blueberry cake. I got her cookbooks right before quarantine so I've been making my way through them -- highly recommend ''the stew'' and the frizzled chic peas. MATT BERMAN: Oh please, I am familiar with ''the stew'' (and would also recommend.). LILY ADAMS: Had it last night. 10/10

MATT BERMAN: Really perfect quarantine meal. So you're now working with Unite the Country, one of the super PACs backing Joe Biden's campaign. What do you see as the aim of the PAC, relative to what some of the other PACs and outside groups supporting Biden are doing?

LILY ADAMS: The most important aim we've got is to tell voters the positive Joe Biden story. There are a lot of PACs and groups out there who have and will do great work to hold Trump accountable but we also need to make sure folks get affirmative reasons they should vote for Joe. Bottom line - we're up against the best funded incumbent in history so it'll take all of us to get it done. MATT BERMAN: There have been a few thousand op-eds over the last week or so from Democrats with advice for Biden In The Basement. If you could magically make the campaign or candidate do one thing differently tomorrow, whether to get at those affirmative reasons or counter the incumbency advantage, what would it be?

Imaget drive -- but I think taking advantage of the digital followings of his supporters or from new platforms like he did with Megan Rapinoe the other day or like he's doing tomorrow with NowThis is a key and easy way to reach huge audiences while in ''The Basement'' -- Lis mentioned this today in her NYT piece and I 100% agree. The truth is though, there's no silver bullet or one magic thing they can do - they've got to do a lot of things at once with a small staff who are all in their homes, during an unprecedented climate that no one's ever experienced before - so I think they're doing well adapting. MATT BERMAN: Absolutely feels like an unprecedented time.

MATT BERMAN: On a bit of a different note, Rebecca Traister's column on the Tara Reade allegation last week has hit a nerve on the left. Do you think progressive women are in a particularly difficult position right now, especially as they've been the ones to consistently face questioning on the allegation?

LILY ADAMS: Well I consider myself to be a progressive and a woman and I haven't found myself to be in a difficult position and I was frankly heartened to have a nominee of the party who took allegations seriously, responded to them with respect and didn't lash out or attack the woman who came forward. Donald Trump has been accused by 50+ women of sexual misconduct including rape, and I don't think I'd use any of those words to describe how he's responded. On the larger point thought - I do think these stories can bring out extremely reductive coverage. When I was working for Senator Harris and allegations were coming out about Al Franken, no female senator could walk two feet without being questioned about them. Meanwhile Sherrod Brown could stand still and have a gaggle about tax reform and Tim Kaine could be over chatting about War Powers and it could never come up.

MATT BERMAN: Do you think that's largely a function of us in the media? One of your tweets getting at some of the press role in this story went pretty viral. IMAGE DESCRIPTION: Tweet from @adamslily reading, ''It's actually *not* inevitable. Know what could prevent it? Reporters could choose not to take the bait of bad faith critiques and actually learn a lesson from 2016. Also remind me where Trump's tax returns are again?''

LILY ADAMS: I don't like to talk about ''the media'' like you all have club meetings to decide how to treat things -- that wouldn't be fair. But that said, I think there are two issues here -- first, there is a trap the press falls into where they get to the process part of the story before they've even considered the facts. That's what I felt was happening on Twitter with the discussion on the Delaware papers. Reporters were just tweeting ''oh well this is just going to be like the emails'' -- when no, it's actually nothing like Hillary's emails (we can save a conversation of the press' treatment of this for another day). But second, I do think Democrats have been held to a higher transparency standard than Trump because reporters have thrown up their hands and decided to accept that they're never getting his tax returns, for example. MATT BERMAN: I can assure you that there are no club meetings, at least any to which I've been invited. LILY ADAMS: I hope they're not just excluding you!

MATT BERMAN: Thank you very much. OK I have a couple last questions for you before letting you go. LILY ADAMS: Fire away. MATT BERMAN: At the start of this election season, you were Kamala Harris' communications director. What's the best argument for her to be Biden's VP? LILY ADAMS: I knew it would be a veep question! MATT BERMAN: Haha we are obvious I guess.

LILY ADAMS: That's hard. I'd kill to go see a movie in a real movie theater. But my real answer is probably go see my folks. I haven't seen my mom & dad in a while and so being completely unable to visit beyond Zoom or House Party has been terrible! But beyond that - just travel. My sister actually lives in Rwanda (where they actually did a real lockdown because the government had a plan, go figure) and I had been hoping to visit her this year so crossing my fingers that's still possible. I realize I just gave you 3 answers...whoops. MATT BERMAN: That's entirely fine, it's a good list. And no reason you couldn't stack them together pretty swiftly! Thank you so much again for taking the time! Hope you can now be liberated from your computer. LILY ADAMS: *Prayer emoji.*

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