There are volunteer slush readers who, if they think something is worthy of publication will send it up the chain where, iirc, Gray Rinehart takes a look and decides whether it needs to go further up the chain. (madgeniusclub.com)
That reader might be an overtaxed and jaded slush reader for a magazine that gets eighty manuscripts a day. (alyxdellamonica.com)
I read chronologically, as I assume most slush readers do, and we don't hold it -LSB-...] (editorialdepartment.com)