Synonyms

muddy the waters

Idioms

Confuse the issue, as in Bringing up one irrelevant fact after another, he succeeded in muddying the waters. This metaphoric expression, alluding to making a pond or stream turbid by stirring up mud from the bottom, was first recorded in 1837.

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:

muddy the waters

Some have tried to muddy the waters on the events of that day, but the record is clear.

From The Wall Street Journal ● May 24, 2026

To muddy the waters further, another of Mark McDonald's panel of experts has said that in fact there was post-mortem evidence of air embolism in the babies.

From BBC ● Aug. 11, 2025

A person's actions, however, can often have some plausible ambiguity that bad faith actors can exploit to muddy the waters.

From Salon ● Apr. 8, 2025

And now, at the eleventh hour, a shadowy group is barging in to muddy the waters even further.

From Slate ● Oct. 29, 2024

“Rae, let’s not do this. You’re an amazing girl and we’ve got a good thing going, so let’s not muddy the waters, okay?”

From "Odd One Out" by Nic Stone

Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023

muddy the waters

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

Related Words