machine politician

English

Noun

machine politician (plural machine politicians)

1. (US) A politician who belongs to a small clique that controls a political party for private rather than public ends.
   • 2021, Mark Lawrence Schrad, Smashing the Liquor Machine: A Global History of Prohibition‎^[1], Oxford University Press, →ISBN, page 413:

     It wasn't that these ward bosses were universally bad men, but the qualities that made for a successful machine politician or boss were the opposite of those that made for an honest public servant.

Related terms

• political machine