Word.ws English Dictionary

passing the buck

passing the buck is the present participle and gerund 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 passing the buck

What is passing the buck the present participle and gerund of?
Passing the buck is the present participle and gerund of pass the buck.

Words near passing the buck in the dictionary

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

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: passing 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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