taint

Meghan had divorced a talent manager in 2014, a taint on her résumé from The Firm’s perspective.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Mar. 11, 2026

He also voiced concern that the draft lottery debate could "negatively taint the whole effort".

From Barron's ● Oct. 18, 2025

And it’s all too easy to accidentally taint a drop of blood at home.

From Slate ● May 28, 2025

Hinch deserves the asterisk removed from his name for the taint of the cheating scandal because he was a minor player and has owned his part in what happened.

From Los Angeles Times ● May 10, 2025

The antiempirical taint of the Pythagoreans survives to this day.

From "Cosmos" by Carl Sagan

“Where is the line between an ethical lapse or a political misjudgment and something that kind of taints this office?” he asked.

From Seattle Times ● Jan. 19, 2024

That authentic silhouette would erase the creep of modernization that taints many rental costumes.

From Los Angeles Times ● Dec. 11, 2023

This anthropological ethnic elitism was a common underpinning feature of much 19th-century archaeology and taints aspects of some of the speculation regarding American Vikings in the 21st century.

From Slate ● Nov. 11, 2023

Anything that taints their preconceived notion of how they should be.

From Salon ● Oct. 11, 2023

As if having a sofa in a house on the ground taints its history in a house up in the sky.

From "Landscape with Invisible Hand" by M.T. Anderson

Although Allen and the original series’ head writer, Susan Fales-Hill, shaped the show into the version considered a sitcom classic, Bill Cosby’s creator credit tainted its reputation.

From Salon ● Sep. 24, 2026

In a victim impact statement, Morgan's mother Marie Smith said the family now "lives under a shadow", with every major milestone "tainted" without her present.

From BBC ● Sep. 4, 2026

District Court Judge Waverly Crenshaw’s May decision to dismiss an indictment against Abrego Garcia after he found it was a blatantly tainted investigation “with a vindictive motive.”

From Slate ● Aug. 23, 2026

She said he had lost 11 of her 18 hectares in a wildfire, and didn't want to spend any money on harvesting surviving vines if the wine would be tainted.

From Barron's ● Aug. 6, 2026

I wanted to say yes, yes, but instead I pushed her away and vomited in her beautiful kitchen, puking foul brown puke into a bowl of tainted water.

From "Anthem of a Reluctant Prophet" by Joanne Proulx

Overturning Balogun’s red card has rankled even some American soccer fans, who see the intervention as tainting a U.S. run that had been gathering momentum.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 6, 2026

And so if “a court always carries out those waivers—no matter the kind or degree of error tainting a sentence—the judicial system’s integrity may come into question.”

From Slate ● Jun. 18, 2026

While none of the investigations target the president, Brazilians' weariness with corruption "ends up tainting those in power," Edinho Silva, head of the Workers' Party, lamented.

From Barron's ● Apr. 24, 2026

His independent streak and defiance of colonial protocols often landed him in trouble - tainting his reputation and perhaps even erasing parts of his contribution from global memory.

From BBC ● Apr. 18, 2025

Petey didn’t want to think about that party, didn’t want to think about the crickets, didn’t want that humiliating night spilling over, tainting this one or any other.

From "Bone Gap" by Laura Ruby