How to Use defenestration in a Sentence

defenestration

noun
  • The defenestration of Steve Bannon will bring some badly needed calm to the White House, at least in the short term.
    Walter Russell Mead, WSJ, 21 Aug. 2017
  • Yet the zeal and speed of his defenestration should give us some discomfort.
    David Thomas, National Review, 15 Mar. 2022
  • There is a risk of course that the G7 may over-reach and the defenestration of the G20 will lead to an inevitable decoupling of global governance.
    Vasuki Shastry, Forbes, 24 June 2022
  • Fresh off its Pruitt defenestration, the left will be looking for new targets, so some advice to the rest of the Trump cabinet: Fly coach.
    The Editorial Board, WSJ, 5 July 2018
  • Many sensed the hand of an older brother with an eye on the future in Andrew’s defenestration.
    Simon Usborne, Town & Country, 13 Mar. 2022
  • Such defenestrations are sad, even to those of us who thought this one necessary.
    Clifford S. Asness, WSJ, 12 Dec. 2023
  • The latest case is that of We Co.’s Adam Neumann, but a few other recent defenestrations support the point.
    Michael Hiltzik, Los Angeles Times, 26 Sep. 2019
  • And there has been all sorts of faux urgency about the need to elect a speaker so the House, leaderless since McCarthy’s defenestration, can get back to business.
    Mark Z. Barabak, Los Angeles Times, 17 Oct. 2023
  • In the days after Alberta’s defenestration of Licht, followup stories have sought to figure out what went wrong and what’s next.
    Ryan Faughnder, Los Angeles Times, 6 June 2023
  • Nobody knows if any of these charges will stick or if Republicans will now be able to engineer the defenestration of Robert Mueller.
    William Cummings, USA TODAY, 28 Oct. 2017
  • From there, the party’s best hope was to turn to McHenry, who had been serving as speaker pro tem ever since McCarthy’s defenestration.
    Alex Shephard, The New Republic, 20 Oct. 2023
  • But even with the defenestration of the hammer brigade, people continued to yell at Matt Yglesias, who continued to be unable to block them.
    Sarah Jeong, The Verge, 2 May 2023
  • Whichever account suits your taste, none points to a cold-blooded defenestration.
    Gregory Krieg, CNN, 13 Mar. 2018
  • The defenestration of Boris Johnson had little to do with morality.
    Alex Story, National Review, 13 July 2022
  • These are people that will strongly resist any defenestration of the heir apparent.
    Ed Kilgore, Daily Intelligencer, 17 May 2018
  • The figurative defenestration of public figures such as Prince Alwaleed bin Talal could be a sign that the crown prince is sending a message to potential rivals to the throne.
    Krishnadev Calamur, The Atlantic, 5 Nov. 2017
  • The defenestration of Warren Kanders from the Whitney Museum boardroom was the most astonishing story of the year.
    Brian T. Allen, National Review, 4 Jan. 2020
  • Tillerson aides later joked that Kennedy’s defenestration was like something out of the Soviet Union, dragging a political foe out into the street and shooting him in the head so as to send a message to others.
    Jason Zengerle, New York Times, 17 Oct. 2017
  • Cheney's defenestration and Stefanik's subsequent ascent were an anticlimax, and not just because the switch-a-roo had been choreographed for weeks.
    Gregory Krieg, CNN, 15 May 2021
  • John Kelly’s ascent to chief of staff, in the wake of the Priebus defenestration, may have set into motion a game of civil-servant musical chairs—or perhaps something slightly more sinister.
    Abigail Tracy, The Hive, 3 Aug. 2017
  • Against that backdrop of foreboding, of darker days ahead, of prime ministerial defenestration and a fresh election, of chaos and confusion, what meaning is there in a state visit?
    Rob Crilly, CNN, 13 June 2017
  • McCabe’s testimony will not be altered by his sudden defenestration at the FBI.
    Andrew Cohen, Esquire, 19 Mar. 2018
  • A digression about the history of defenestration in Scotland shows that even writers as prolific as McCall Smith are not immune to the pleasures of falling down a rabbit hole while doing research.
    Bethanne Patrick, The Denver Post, 24 Feb. 2017
  • Donald Trump sacked Rex Tillerson as secretary of state, announcing the defenestration on Twitter.
    The Economist, 15 Mar. 2018
  • But the Hashemites are usually disciplined about showing a united front in public: Prince Hassan accepted his defenestration in silence.
    The Economist, 5 Apr. 2021
  • But the indulgence of his novella—scenes of blasphemy, defenestration, disaster, augury—is offset by the Latinate solidity of his prose.
    Dustin Illingworth, The New Yorker, 20 May 2020
  • Still, several investors complained about the manner of Mr Cryan’s defenestration, which could make for a turbulent annual shareholders’ meeting next month.
    The Economist, 12 Apr. 2018
  • The last time Fatah lost an election, the opposition celebrated with mass defenestration.
    David Harsanyi, National Review, 20 Apr. 2021
  • But in the aftermath of Mistry’s defenestration, Tata Sons has sought to portray Mistry as a bumbling corporate naïf, dependent for ideas on a coterie of outside advisers and flummoxed by the complexities of running a large conglomerate.
    Clay Chandler, Fortune, 21 July 2017
  • And now, in spite of its electoral success, the supposedly more orthodox and settled Johnson administration that followed the defenestration of Cummings and Cain looks increasingly unstable.
    Fintan O’Toole, The New York Review of Books, 13 May 2021

Some of these examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'defenestration.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.

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