"We know that the levels that were agreed to by the prior administration would be highly crippling to the US economic growth," Mr Cohn said, quoted by AFP news agency.However, Mr Cohn said Mr Trump was "interested in what the G7 leaders have to say" and that he would decide when he returned home from the summit.
Other G7 leaders are also concerned that the US president might promote a protectionist agenda.
German weekly Der Spiegel quoted Mr Trump as saying in a meeting with European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker on Thursday that Germans were "very bad" on its car sales to the US, and vowed to "stop this".
During his election campaign he threatened customs duties in retaliation for Germany's trade surplus with the US, saying it owed "vast sums of money" to the US and Nato.
Mr Cohn sought to clarify the president's position on the eve of the summit.
"What the president means by free and open is, we will treat you the way you treat us, meaning if you don't have barriers to trade or you don't have tariffs, we won't have tariffs," he said, quoted by Reuters.
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