assassination
Americannoun
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the premeditated act of killing someone suddenly or secretively, especially a prominent person.
The meticulous way in which the journalist's assassination was carried out has led to suspicions that his killers were professionals working for state security.
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the act of destroying or harming treacherously and viciously.
They went after me with everything they had, engaging in character assassination and in destroying my reputation—a complete fabrication and frame-up.
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Etymology
Origin of assassination
Explanation
An assassination is the murder of a public figure. Assassinations are usually politically motivated. If someone kills your dog, that’s not an assassination, that’s just murder (unless your dog was running for mayor). A murder is the unjust, illegal killing of someone. An assassination is a type of murder in which the victim is someone well known, usually in the world of politics. The killings of John F. Kennedy and Martin Luther King were assassinations: their purpose was to destabilize the government and hurt the civil rights movement, respectively. As assassination is murder plus politics.
Vocabulary lists containing assassination
American History I
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March Vocabulary Words
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World War I
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Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
On election day, Pelosi lost the Democratic vote to Harry Britt, who succeeded Harvey Milk on the Board of Supervisors after Milk’s assassination.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 26, 2026
The White House Correspondents’ Association dinner is being held Friday, after an attempted assassination of President Trump canceled the April event.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 24, 2026
US President Donald Trump will return to the White House Correspondents' Dinner amid heightened security on Friday, three months after an alleged assassination attempt forced his chaotic evacuation from the event.
From Barron's ● Jul. 24, 2026
Between 1918 and his assassination in 1948, Gandhi fasted repeatedly - against religious violence, caste discrimination and political discord - turning the empty plate into one of the defining symbols of India's freedom struggle.
From BBC ● Jul. 16, 2026
Mary could remember the days after the assassination when her parents forbade her and her seven siblings from leaving the house because just outside their windows a war was unfolding.
From "The Other Wes Moore: One Name, Two Fates" by Wes Moore
Vietnam, inner-city riots, and the assassinations of Robert F. Kennedy and Martin Luther King Jr. had cast a pall over the Day-Glo optimism of the Love Generation.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 10, 2026
Unlike so many retellings of famous assassinations, attempted or otherwise, Harron’s movie gets to the heart of its subject’s discontent without dwelling on dramatizations of Solanas’ fragile psyche.
From Salon ● Apr. 29, 2026
"Well, you know, I've studied assassinations," Trump said.
From Barron's ● Apr. 26, 2026
It’s true that some presidents, like Theodore Roosevelt, Harry Truman, and Gerald Ford, didn’t enjoy clear electoral boons after failed assassinations.
From Slate ● Apr. 26, 2026
The executive branch of the government—Vice President Johnson and the cabinet—had survived the night; no other assassinations had occurred.
From "Chasing Lincoln's Killer" by James L. Swanson
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
