GOP lawmakers, foreign leaders and markets wait to see if Trump’s tariffs are open for negotiation

As President Donald Trump departed the White House on Thursday afternoon — his first time in public since announcing sweeping new tariffs that have jolted global markets and sparked recession fears — he likened the duties he imposed this week to a successful medical procedure.

As President Donald Trump departed the White House on Thursday afternoon — his first time in public since announcing sweeping new tariffs that have jolted global markets and sparked recession fears — he likened the duties he imposed this week to a successful medical procedure. “I think it’s going well,” Trump said, as the Dow Jones Industrial Average traded down more than 3% and as one US automaker laid off 900 hourly workers, citing reduced production prompted by the tariffs. “It was an operation, when like a patient gets operated on,” the president said. In reality, the operation hasn’t even begun. The new duties he announced will take effect at the end of this week and next, likely thrusting the global economy into uncharted territory and putting Trump’s economic acumen to the test. But how much the president is willing to bend on his new tariffs was a question foreign leaders, Republican lawmakers and Wall Street investors were all asking as the tariff plan came into sharper focus. The message from Trump’s top advisers was one of resolute commitment to the heavy duties applied to all US trading partners, friend and foe alike. “The president is not going to back off,” Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick told CNN’s Pamela Brown in an interview Thursday. But the president himself suggested he was open for talks — if the terms were good enough.