This is GPS, the Global Public Square. Welcome to all of you in the United States and around the world. I'm Farid Zikaria, coming to you live.

Today on the show, President Biden has signed into law a $1.9 trillion relief package that will deliver much aid to America's poorest.

But the economic world is asking the Goldilocks question, is it too big, too small, or just the right size?

I'll talk to two of the world's foremost economists, Larry Summers and Poor Prove them.

Then, what is the Quad? President Biden met with the leaders of Japan, India and Australia. A new block focused on deterring China.

Will it work? I'll talk to an expert.

And the biotech revolution brought us the COVID-19 vaccines more swiftly than almost anyone imagined possible.

It's given us the ability to edit genes to cure diseases and the innovations on the horizon are even more extraordinary.

I will ask Walter Isaacson to describe what's next.

But first, here's my take. Within hours of being inaugurated, President Biden began to roll back Donald Trump's most egregious immigration policies, including the so-called Muslim ban, which Biden called a stain on our national conscience.

He signed six executive actions, all geared toward a more humane and generous policy, and outlined an ambitious proposal for comprehensive immigration reform, including a path to citizenship for the more than 10 million undocumented immigrants living and working in America.

The Biden administration has begun the work of reversing literally hundreds of other rules, regulations and fees put in place by Trump, all designed to make it harder for foreigners at every stage of the process, from tourists to immigrants to enter or stay in the United States.

Unfortunately, all these vital efforts could be undermined by decisions that are producing a new immigration crisis on America's southern border.

In recent years, hundreds of thousands of central Americans have tried to enter the United States to ask for asylum.

The Trump administration initially used cruel tactics, including separating children from their parents and putting them in cages, but eventually arrived at a practical policy.

It stopped taking in asylum seekers at the southern border, forcing them instead to wait in Mexico for their cases to be resolved, and it negotiated agreements that allowed the U.S. to send people back to Central America to seek asylum in a neighboring country rather than in the United States.

Now Biden has overturned those policies, and that, combined with expectations of a more generous approach to immigration, have contributed to the current surge of migrants.

Nearly 180,000 people have arrived at the southern border or tried to cross illegally in 2021, more than double as many as in the first two months of 2020.

These numbers will increase as it gets warmer. Officials at the border are already overwhelmed.

There has been a particularly large surge of unaccompanied children, probably the result of a Biden decision to create an exception for them to enthrompal the barring migrants on health grounds.

As of Friday, federal authorities were scrambling to find places to house some 4,000 children languishing at border patrol stations, and were even looking at an airfield and an army base.

The truth is the asylum system is out of control.

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