The Philippine House voted to impeach Vice President Sara Duterte for the second time (Image credit: AP)
An overwhelming majority of the Philippine House of Representatives voted Monday to impeach Vice President Sara Duterte on charges of graft, corruption, bribery, misuse of state funds and alleged assassination threats against President Ferdinand Marcos Jr., throwing her declared 2028 presidential run into doubt.The House, dominated by Marcos’s allies, voted 255-26 with nine abstentions to send the impeachment complaints to the Senate, which will convene as a tribunal for his trial. Under a guilty verdict, Duterte would be removed from office and barred from holding elected office for life.The vice president, the daughter of former President Rodrigo Duterte, has generally denied any wrongdoing without addressing the criminal allegations in detail.
Duterte’s ally elected Senate president minutes before voting
In a significant development, minutes before the House votes, the Senate elected Senator Alan Peter Cayetano, a longtime ally of Vice President Duterte, as its new president. Cayetano, who served as foreign secretary under former President Rodrigo Duterte, replaced Vicente Sotto III after a 13-9 vote with two abstentions.Changes in Senate leadership could play a significant role in the outcome of the impeachment trial. Cayetano denied any connection between his election and the House vote.“If you’re saying the change in leadership was caused by impeachment, I don’t blame you. It wasn’t,” he said shortly after the Senate vote.
what happens next
One of the most serious allegations in the complaint involves more than $110 million in private bank transactions flagged by the anti-money laundering agency.House member Terry Ridon, one of the lead complainants, said in a statement, “The scale of these transactions cannot be reasonably explained by the legitimate income, declared assets, or businesses and professional activities attributed to the couple.”The articles of impeachment also accuse Duterte of making alleged assassination threats against Marcos, his wife Liza Araneta and former House Speaker Martin Romualdez.Under the Philippine Constitution, impeachment leads to a trial in the Senate, where a two-thirds majority vote is required to convict and remove him from office. A guilty verdict would disqualify him from holding any government office.The previous impeachment motion against Duterte was passed by the House in 2025 with 215 votes, but was later struck down by the Supreme Court due to constitutional technicalities.Duterte and Marcos ran as a ticket in the 2022 elections, but their political alliance later fell apart, leading to acrimony. Duterte has already declared his intention to run for president in 2028.On May 7, Duterte said that whatever the outcome of the impeachment would be “written by God.”“Based on our earlier discussion with former President Duterte, everything that happens in a person’s life is written by God. So, if I am impeached, that is written by God. If I am not impeached, see you tomorrow,” he told supporters after meeting his father in The Hague.