Tolentino, Pimentel spar over Sara impeachment, citing constitutional gaps
MANILA, Philippines — Senate Majority Leader Francis Tolentino and Senate Minority Leader Koko Pimentel clashed on Monday over the fate of Vice President Sara Duterte’s impeachment trial as the Senate opened its session.
At the start of the Senate’s session on June 2, Tolentino raised concerns about the possibility of the 20th Congress continuing an impeachment trial initiated by the 19th Congress. He argued that when a Congress ends, all legislative and investigative work must terminate.
“If we cannot conclude the trial before June 30, 2025, we must recognize that this impeachment case is functionally dismissed,” Tolentino said.
Pimentel challenged Tolentino’s position, noting that the 1987 Constitution does not explicitly prohibit impeachment trials from crossing over between Congresses.
“On the contrary, the Senate Rules on Impeachment support the position that the impeachment trial shall continue until final judgment, even if it is necessary to continue into the next Congress,” Pimentel said.
Pimentel added that the Senate’s legislative function is distinct from its judicial role in impeachment proceedings.
Tolentino, however, maintained that there are no existing rules mandating a trial to carry over.
“The Constitution is silent as to the word ‘carry over’, ‘crossover’, ‘continue’,” Tolentino said.
Bigger picture. Tolentino further argued that unlike the 1935 Constitution, patterned after the U.S. Constitution, the 1987 Constitution lacks provisions supporting impeachment trial continuity.
He explained that in the U.S., staggered Senate elections leave enough senators to meet the two-thirds requirement to acquit or convict an impeached official. The U.S. has around 100 senators, with elections every two years for 33 seats, leaving 67 senators on duty.
In the Philippines, Tolentino said, only 12 senators remain on duty between elections, which is not enough to meet the two-thirds requirement needed for impeachment.
Both Tolentino and Pimentel, who are lawyers, noted that the matter of Duterte’s impeachment has already been raised to the Supreme Court—by both those seeking to compel the Senate to proceed with the trial and those wanting to block it.
The impeachment trial was lodged on the Senate’s last day before it went on break, leaving it in limbo for more than three months.
With the Senate’s reopening, Senate President Francis Escudero moved to reschedule the reading of the articles of impeachment from June 2 to June 11, just days before the Senate closes session once more.
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