foot-dragging
Americannoun
Etymology
Origin of foot-dragging
First recorded in 1945–50; from the verb phrase drag one's feet
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.
These twinned crises put the U.S. on its slow, foot-dragging path toward energy independence.
From Los Angeles Times • Mar. 18, 2026
The bureaucratic foot-dragging has to end so that America can do the same.
From The Wall Street Journal • Feb. 15, 2026
As the first of the dead were laid to rest Wednesday, Jewish Australians said they felt unsafe, angry and frustrated at perceived government foot-dragging in confronting antisemitism.
From Barron's • Dec. 17, 2025
Hernandez admonished the Corps for having “fought tooth and nail” against better measures for fish, foot-dragging that the judge said had pushed the fish closer to the edge of extinction.
From Salon • Nov. 2, 2023
And I have never crossed it without sharing something with those early families foot-dragging through this terrestrial hell, leaving the white skeletons of horses and cattle which still mark the way.
From "Travels with Charley in Search of America" by John Steinbeck
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.
