take a back seat

English

take a back seat (third-person singular simple present takes a back seat, present participle taking a back seat, simple past took a back seat, past participle taken a back seat)

(idiomatic) To adopt a position of noninvolvement.
The new chairman is happy to take a back seat when it comes to day-to-day operations.
(idiomatic) To be second to someone or something; to be less important or have a lower priority.
Antonym: take the front seat
- 2004, My Life by Bill Clinton
  But as with most kids, politics took a backseat to daily life.
- 2017 January 14, “Thailand's new king rejects the army's proposed constitution”, in The Economist‎^[1]:
  The bluntness of King Vajiralongkorn's intervention—and the determination it reveals to resist relatively small checks on royal power—is both a snub to the junta and a worry for democrats, some of whom had dared hope that the new king might be happy to take a back seat in public life.
- 2023 April 29, Noam Scheiber, John Koblin, “Will a Chatbot Write the Next ‘Succession’?”, in The New York Times‎^[2]:
  Mr. August, a screenwriter for movies like “Charlie’s Angels” and “Charlie and the Chocolate Factory,” said that while artificial intelligence had taken a back seat to compensation in the Writers Guild negotiation, the union was making two key demands on the subject of automation.