holdover
5
6.6
- noun
- /ˈhoʊlˌoʊvər/
- Formal
:
interino
- The only politically appointed head of the BLS during Obama's term was a Republican holdover, appointed by Bush.
It was first the Bush administration and then some holdovers like Ben Bernanke.
- It was first the Bush administration and then some holdovers like Ben Bernanke.
Examples
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Others have much longer tenure, are holdovers from Gov. Jon Huntsman’s administration, and seem more likely to change.
Blog text (11) -
Many of the holdover coaches were also a part of the recruiting process for years, so the level of continuity was there compared to the wholesale changes at SMU.
Blog text (15) -
Nonetheless, almost everyone on City Council today is a holdover of the Big Town era or still clings to the Big Town power structure for support.
Blog text (19) -
Holding, a Republican holdover appointed by President George W. Bush, had a political vendetta against Edwards, sources close to Edwards' legal team have argued.
Blog text (17) -
His new cabinet included no holdovers from the Ben Ali era, and within one week's time, he announced the abolition of the hated secret police.
Academic text (2011) -
Protesters also demanded the ouster of the country's top prosecutor, a Mubarak holdover whom Morsi tried unsuccessfully to remove from his post.
Blog text (3) -
Although he’s the only Bush holdover in Obama’s cabinet (for that matter, the only defense secretary ever to keep the job after a party switch in the White House), Gates now has extraordinary influence on Obama.
Academic text (2010) -
Thus, Kenya's democratic transition is held in check not only by Moi and the incumbent party but also by institutional holdovers from the single-party era that allow political leaders and winning coalitions to undermine the public interest.
Academic text (1998) -
The new president is working with a holdover from the previous administration until a new team is appointed.
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During the transition, he relied on a holdover to manage the department's ongoing projects.
Antonyms
How Temporary
Surface Forms
Morphology
holdover = hold (semi-transparent) = over + hold
Built from the phrasal verb 'hold over' and nominalized to refer to a person retained from a previous administration; the structure is clear but the specific occupational sense requires idiomatic knowledge. [Postprocessing: moved 'over' from base_words to prefix]
Etymology
Holdover comes from the simple words hold and over, which mean 'keep' and 'after', and it helps to picture someone 'held over' in a job until a replacement arrives. So a holdover official is a person who stays in office after their time ends, usually until a new person takes the job.