velvet glove

Example Sentences

Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.

“We’ve got to a point where we can no longer be able to afford the velvet glove diplomacy.”

From Seattle Times • Sep. 16, 2023

Iron fist in a velvet glove: Smiling all the while, Nan manipulates the Roy children into overpaying $10 billion just so they can outbid their now-rivalrous father.

From Los Angeles Times • Aug. 14, 2023

Still, within the velvet glove remains an iron fist.

From New York Times • Jan. 13, 2022

A Republican colleague, Rep. E. Clay Shaw Jr., once told the Herald that Ms. Meek had “a velvet glove, but sometimes she can have a fist in it. She’s so likable that it’s sometimes disarming.”

From Washington Post • Nov. 29, 2021

He had seen also something of the forces which controlled them, caught glimpses of the iron hand in the velvet glove, a hand that was not so sure and steady as in days gone by.

From Poor Man's Rock by Johnson, Frank Tenney