to pull
- verb
- /pʊl/
- Informal
- Looks like you pulled it off.
- pull the plug
- pull the rug out
- pull a gun
I think an immense con has been pulled on the American people.
- I think an immense con has been pulled on the American people.
- What's the significance of having pulled this off as a college student?
- There were also all sorts of dirty tricks they could pull on their customers too.
- Oh man, that's my favorite pulling that off.
Examples
-
If a homework pass was pulled, the entire class was exempt from the work.
Academic text (1991) -
But to pull it off, we're gonna need a pretty sweet diversion.
-
Nobody really thought he could pull it off. "But apparently he has," Ross said.
Fiction book (1990) -
I think an immense con has been pulled on the American people.
-
I think an immense con has been pulled on the American people.
-
That's going to be difficult to pull off, I would suspect, given the short notice.
-
But to pull it off, we're gonna need a pretty sweet diversion.
Synonyms
To do something illegal or wrong
To do a harmful or illegal act
To trick someone in a clever way so they do not notice
To trick someone to gain an advantage
Do something foolish that shocks or angers other people
Antonyms
Idioms
Make your situation better by working hard without help
- Informal
Find a surprising way to solve a problem at the last moment
Save someone from a difficult situation at the last moment
- Offensive
Make up ideas quickly without preparing or checking facts
To promise help again and again and then take it away at the last moment
To suddenly stop helping someone, leaving them in a difficult situation
- Literature
To mention being a woman or man to avoid blame and get sympathy
To succeed and then stop others from getting the same chances
- Archaic
To tell a story in a way that makes what happened sound bigger or not true
Phrasal Verbs
- Informal
Get control of your feelings and calm down after being upset
To survive a serious illness or danger, often with help from others, and start to get better
- Literature
To take a short line from a text and show it separately to get attention
Compounds
- Specialized
A rise in general prices caused by higher production costs like wages and raw materials
- Specialized
A rise in prices when people want to buy more things than before
How Serious
Surface Forms
Etymology
Pull can mean to carry out an act because of the idea 'to make something happen' from old English pullen, so to pull a trick is to produce or cause that action.