soft money

noun
1.
money contributed to a political candidate or party that is not subject to federal regulations.
Examples from the web for soft money
  • Not enough to really sway anyone, but enough to alleviate the need for oodles of soft money.
  • Parties would at first be weakened, compared with outside groups, because so much of their activity depends on soft money.
  • Committee members want testimony at the hearings to influence the legislation, which proposes a ban on soft money.
  • The soft money ban federalizes many activities of national, state and local political parties.
  • State and local party committees' use of soft money.
  • soft money, some argue, is another potential supplement for candidates.
  • soft money represents the unraveling of these three laws.
  • And these types of contributions were called soft money.
  • The figures do not take into account soft money expenditures.
  • These soft money faculty in particular have little or no teaching responsibilities.
British Dictionary definitions for soft money

soft money

noun
1.
(politics) (in the US) money that can be spent by a political party on grass-roots organization, recruitment, advertising, etc; it must be deposited in a party's non-federal (state-level) bank accounts, and must not be used in connection with presidential or congressional elections Compare hard money
Slang definitions & phrases for soft money

soft money

noun phrase
  1. Currency that is highly inflated or likely to become less and less valuable: During the first two months of this year, soft money contributions, chiefly from industry, flowed into the coffers of the Republican National Committee (1940+)
  2. Campaign donations that are not regulated by the Federal Election Commission: raising millions of dollars of what is known in election-financing language as ''soft money''/ Clinton is behind in the collection of soft money, funds that are supposed to go for ''party-building activities'' but can make a big difference in a Presidential contest (1980s+ Politics)
  3. Money from research grants, which may run out if the grant is not renewed (1976+ Universities)

[modeled on hard money]