Word.ws English Dictionary

passes the buck

passes the buck is the third-person singular simple present indicative of pass the buck.

Meaning of pass the buck

Verb

pass the buck (third-person singular simple present passes the buck, present participle passing the buck, simple past and past participle passed the buck)

  1. (idiomatic, informal) To transfer responsibility or blame from oneself onto another; to absolve oneself of concern for a given matter by claiming to lack authority or jurisdiction.
    • McLean was quoted in the Austin American Statesman as saying that although he had expected the guidelines to be ruled illegal, an attorney general's opinion […] was required in order to clarify the law. But critics say Bernstein and McLean simply passed the buck to the attorney general in order to...1990 February 4, David Morris, “Attorney General Sides With Texas Gay Groups”, in Gay Community News, volume 17, number 29, page 3

Questions about passes the buck

What is passes the buck the third-person singular simple present indicative of?
Passes the buck is the third-person singular simple present indicative of pass the buck.

Words near passes the buck in the dictionary

  1. passes round the hat
  2. passes sentence
  3. passes the bar
  4. passes the baton
  5. passes the bottle of smoke
  6. passes the buck
  7. passes the hat
  8. passes the mantle
  9. passes the phone
  10. passes the pikes
  11. passes the river

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: passes the buck (page history and authors); pass the buck (page history and authors). Text available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 license. Word.ws reformatted the entry and added links. Wiktionary data of 2026-09-02.

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