How to Use legitimize in a Sentence

legitimize

verb
Definition of legitimizenext
Synonyms for legitimizenext
  • And then the czar stuff, is that at every point Putin has tried to legitimize himself.
    — CBS News, 7 Dec. 2022
  • But others say that this would legitimize the stronger party.
    — Niha Masih, Washington Post, 11 Mar. 2024
  • The victory vaulted the Spartans into the top 150 of the NET rankings and helped legitimize them to the public.
    — Connor Letourneau, San Francisco Chronicle, 28 Dec. 2022
  • Bottom line here is this: Utah no longer has to play to legitimize its entire program.
    — Gordon Monson, The Salt Lake Tribune, 31 Dec. 2022
  • Part of me still wanted Dylan to legitimize my creative work, or at least my choice to pursue it.
    — Sam Sussman, Harper's Magazine, 27 Apr. 2021
  • The fact that the victim is making payments of principal and interest might legitimize the claim.
    — Annie Lane, oregonlive, 15 Apr. 2023
  • But, like so many facets of the GOP, the company has legitimized radical voices in recent years.
    — Oliver Darcy, CNN, 17 Oct. 2023
  • Elon Musk helped legitimize cryptocurrencies in the eyes of Wall Street investors.
    — Anchalee Worrachate, Fortune, 18 May 2021
  • The visit by the AfD lawmakers stands to legitimize the Kremlin’s claims that the regions need Russian protection.
    — Kate Brady, Washington Post, 20 Sep. 2022
  • Moreover, by voting for Putin in 2024, Russians will legitimize his war.
    — Andrei Kolesnikov, Foreign Affairs, 1 Dec. 2023
  • In 1922, the League of Nations legitimized the occupation by issuing a mandate that made Palestine akin to a British colony.
    — Sonja Anderson, Smithsonian Magazine, 24 Aug. 2023
  • To help his friend, Jack agrees to a dual lecture, an Elvis/Hitler crossover event to legitimize Murray’s new endeavor.
    — Jennifer Wilson, The New Republic, 27 Dec. 2022
  • The junta says elections last year were marred by widespread fraud, a claim disputed by monitors, and has sought to legitimize its rule.
    — Feliz Solomon, WSJ, 16 Oct. 2021
  • The governments of Russia and Qatar see the World Cup as a gateway to normalize their backward regimes, to use sport to legitimize their atrocities.
    — WSJ, 29 Nov. 2022
  • Most of the workers in the warehouse are Black, according to union organizers, and the backing from Black Lives Matter could help further legitimize the cause.
    — Joseph Pisani, ajc, 12 Mar. 2021
  • Vivek hopes a positive ruling would legitimize his relationship with his husband in the eyes of the wider public.
    — Rhea Mogul, CNN, 16 Oct. 2023
  • Michael Patrick King wanted to legitimize this character and ground this character [with].
    — Marquia Walton, ELLE, 20 July 2023
  • The audacity to legitimize her own gaze — within her work, among her lovers, about herself — was groundbreaking for a female artist in 1920s Paris.
    — Los Angeles Times, 1 July 2022
  • The text messages show just two days before the electoral vote certification, Lee was trying to find a way to legitimize overturning the vote.
    — Bryan Schott, The Salt Lake Tribune, 20 Apr. 2022
  • His praise of the woman’s ergon kalon, her beautiful act, helped legitimize the church budgets that afterward were set aside for effigies and bling.
    — Julian Bell, The New York Review of Books, 20 July 2023
  • The young people’s complaints about overwork have helped legitimize Mr. Xi’s crackdown, experts say.
    — Ann Scott Tyson, The Christian Science Monitor, 15 Nov. 2021
  • This would legitimize weight stigma as both a social injustice and a public health issue.
    — Rebecca Puhl, The Conversation, 1 June 2021
  • Kennedy’s role in legitimizing anti-vaccine activism has not been limited to the U.S.
    — Michelle R. Smith, Fortune, 18 Oct. 2023
  • Critics allege that the meeting serves to legitimize thuggish behavior by the Saudi regime.
    — Grayson Quay, The Week, 4 Dec. 2021
  • Uber’s teen program legitimizes the practice and presents a lucrative opportunity for Uber to tap a new pool of riders.
    — Bloomberg Wire, Dallas News, 17 May 2023
  • But then people feel more legitimized when it’s related to the physical trauma.
    — Elizabeth Cooney, STAT, 6 July 2023
  • Talking to the rebels directly would accord them recognition and also legitimize the Kremlin's false claim that the conflict in Ukraine is a civil war, in which Russia is not involved.
    — Patrick Reevell, ABC News, 9 Feb. 2022
  • But appearing with Robert F. Kennedy Jr. would likely only legitimize those views.
    — Alex Shephard, The New Republic, 19 June 2023
  • This box set was Columbia’s attempt to legitimize and circulate them.
    — Brady Gerber, Vulture, 30 Jan. 2023
  • Gorbachev's vision was to legitimize communism by putting a democratic face on it.
    — ABC News, 30 Aug. 2022

Some of these examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'legitimize.' 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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