{"id":21450,"date":"2026-09-23T23:24:15","date_gmt":"2026-09-23T15:24:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.journaldailynewsonline.com.ph\/?p=21450"},"modified":"2026-09-23T23:24:15","modified_gmt":"2026-09-23T15:24:15","slug":"escudero-votes-no-to-change-in-conviction-threshold-rule","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.journaldailynewsonline.com.ph\/index.php\/2026\/09\/23\/escudero-votes-no-to-change-in-conviction-threshold-rule\/","title":{"rendered":"ESCUDERO VOTES NO TO CHANGE IN CONVICTION THRESHOLD RULE"},"content":{"rendered":"

IMPEACHMENT Court Presiding Officer Francis \u201cChiz\u201d Escudero on Wednesday voted no on lowering the conviction threshold in the impeachment trial of Vice President Sara Duterte, reaffirming his July\u202f6 ruling that conviction requires 16 votes under the Constitution.<\/strong><\/p>\n

The Senate, sitting as an impeachment court, voted 13 in favor, with one abstention and six not participating on Senator Erwin Tulfo\u2019s motion to revisit the threshold rule. <\/strong><\/p>\n

Escudero emphasized that the Court\u2019s interpretation would operate pro hac vice, or \u201cfor this occasion only,\u201d and would not bind future impeachment proceedings. <\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cThis has never happened before, and the Chair hopes that it shall never happen again,\u201d he said, underscoring the extraordinary circumstances that led to the ruling.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Explaining his vote, Escudero said the impeachment court must apply Article XI, Section 3(6) of the 1987 Charter according to its plain language.<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cThe Chair stands by his July 6 ruling. Article XI, Section 3(6) of the Constitution must be given its plain and literal meaning. The Chair finds no basis in the constitutional text for interpreting it otherwise,\u201d Escudero told the Senate sitting as an impeachment court. <\/strong><\/p>\n

He cited four reasons for rejecting alternative interpretations of the voting requirement.<\/strong><\/p>\n

First, Escudero noted that the word \u201cpresent\u201d was intentionally omitted from the 1987 Philippine Constitution, even though it appeared in the U.S. version from which the provision was derived. <\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cThe word \u2018present\u2019 was omitted from the 1935 Constitution, even if it was originally contained in the first complete draft of the 1934 Constitutional Convention. And it was never restored in the 1973 nor the 1987 Constitutions,\u201d he noted.\u00a0 <\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cIn other words, the word \u2018present\u2019 was intentionally omitted and has remained absent from our Constitution ever since. What the Constitution has omitted, for me, cannot now be restored by interpretation,\u201d he added.\u00a0 <\/strong><\/p>\n

Second, Escudero pointed out that Senate membership in the Senate should not be confused with a senator\u2019s ability or eligibility to vote. Absence or incapacity, he said, does not alter the fact that the Senate is composed of 24 members, as mandated by Article VI, Section 2.\u00a0 <\/strong><\/p>\n

Third, he warned that lowering the denominator would create fractional votes and what he described as absurd outcomes. Reducing the denominator one senator at a time, he explained, would make conviction easier to secure than acquittal\u2014a result the framers of the Charter could not have intended.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Escudero added that if the denominator were reduced to as few as four members from 24 senators, the number of votes needed to convict would fall more often than the number needed to acquit. <\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cThe conviction threshold falls 13 times, while the acquittal threshold falls only seven times. In other words, a variable denominator makes it easier to secure a judgement of conviction compared to a judgement of acquittal.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n

Fourth, Escudero invoked the principle of \u201cin dubio pro reo,\u201d which directs that genuine doubt be resolved in favor of the accused. He said conviction should not be made easier by implication or inference when constitutional doubt remains.\u00a0 <\/strong><\/p>\n

\u201cTerminating an elected mandate before the end of its term is among the most drastic acts our constitutional democracy can undertake. Therefore, when the Constitution fixes the conditions and number for imposing a judgment of conviction, those conditions should not be relaxed by implication, nor should the number rise or fall according to the contingencies of the day,\u201d he said. <\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

IMPEACHMENT Court Presiding Officer Francis “Chiz” Escudero on Wednesday voted no on lowering the conviction threshold in the impeachment trial of Vice President Sara Duterte,<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":21451,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[5],"tags":[],"featured_image_urls":{"full":["https:\/\/www.journaldailynewsonline.com.ph\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/ESCUDERO-ANSWERS-NO.jpg",532,343,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/www.journaldailynewsonline.com.ph\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/ESCUDERO-ANSWERS-NO-150x150.jpg",150,150,true],"medium":["https:\/\/www.journaldailynewsonline.com.ph\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/ESCUDERO-ANSWERS-NO-300x193.jpg",300,193,true],"medium_large":["https:\/\/www.journaldailynewsonline.com.ph\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/ESCUDERO-ANSWERS-NO.jpg",532,343,false],"large":["https:\/\/www.journaldailynewsonline.com.ph\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/ESCUDERO-ANSWERS-NO.jpg",532,343,false],"1536x1536":["https:\/\/www.journaldailynewsonline.com.ph\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/ESCUDERO-ANSWERS-NO.jpg",532,343,false],"2048x2048":["https:\/\/www.journaldailynewsonline.com.ph\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/ESCUDERO-ANSWERS-NO.jpg",532,343,false],"kreeti-slider-full":["https:\/\/www.journaldailynewsonline.com.ph\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/ESCUDERO-ANSWERS-NO.jpg",532,343,false],"kreeti-featured":["https:\/\/www.journaldailynewsonline.com.ph\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/ESCUDERO-ANSWERS-NO.jpg",532,343,false],"kreeti-medium":["https:\/\/www.journaldailynewsonline.com.ph\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/ESCUDERO-ANSWERS-NO.jpg",532,343,false],"kreeti-medium-square":["https:\/\/www.journaldailynewsonline.com.ph\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/ESCUDERO-ANSWERS-NO-350x343.jpg",350,343,true]},"author_info":{"info":["admin"]},"category_info":"National<\/a>","tag_info":"National","comment_count":"0","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.journaldailynewsonline.com.ph\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21450"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.journaldailynewsonline.com.ph\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.journaldailynewsonline.com.ph\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.journaldailynewsonline.com.ph\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.journaldailynewsonline.com.ph\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21450"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.journaldailynewsonline.com.ph\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21450\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":21452,"href":"https:\/\/www.journaldailynewsonline.com.ph\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21450\/revisions\/21452"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.journaldailynewsonline.com.ph\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/21451"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.journaldailynewsonline.com.ph\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21450"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.journaldailynewsonline.com.ph\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21450"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.journaldailynewsonline.com.ph\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21450"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}