Word.ws English Dictionary

push backs

push backs is the plural of push back.

Meaning of push back

Verb

push back (third-person singular simple present pushes back, present participle pushing back, simple past and past participle pushed back)

  1. To refute or argue against a position or an accusation; to express one's own view on a situation.
    • The scandal is growing legs. We need to start pushing back.
  2. To postpone.
    • The Friday meeting keeps getting pushed back to the following week.
  3. (migration) To summarily expel asylum seekers, especially in violation of the principle of non-refoulement.
    • EU member states have used illegal operations to push back at least 40,000 asylum seekers from Europe’s borders during the pandemic[…]2021 May 5, Lorenzo Tondo, “Revealed: 2,000 refugee deaths linked to illegal EU pushbacks”, in The Guardian
  4. Used other than figuratively or idiomatically: see push, back.

Questions about push backs

What is push backs the plural of?
Push backs is the plural of push back.

Words near push backs in the dictionary

  1. push and shove
  2. push around
  3. push aside
  4. push away
  5. push back
  6. push backs
  7. push bicycle
  8. push bike
  9. push biked
  10. push bikes
  11. push biking

Source and license

Adapted from Wiktionary: push backs (page history and authors); push back (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.

Last updated:

Cite this entry: “push backs.” Word.ws, https://word.ws/push_backs. Based on Wiktionary, CC BY-SA 4.0.