escalate

Some hoped he would follow through on his dovish campaign rhetoric, others thought he might escalate conflict in the Middle East.

Then, in response to Trump’s claim that during their phone call, he asked—in some accounts, warned—Putin not to escalate the war in Ukraine, a Kremlin spokesman denied that the two had spoken on the phone at all.

The city is in a drought watch, and Iscol expects that these restrictions will soon escalate.

White doesn’t keep a lawyer on retainer, but she knows lawyers who are “willing to glance at something I’ve received in my email inbox and reach out to offer support should one of those threats escalate into something more tangible” — which hasn’t yet happened.

She accepted at the inquiry into the scandal that it was "extremely disappointing" that it took the ITV drama to escalate the issue.