Senator Robin Padilla admitted he relied on an internet search to make sense of the legal questions at the heart of Monday’s dispute over who should lead the impeachment court trying Vice President Sara Duterte, before joining the minority in voting against Senator Francis “Chiz” Escudero for the role.
“Humingi ako ng tulong sa Google kasi legal terms ito. Hindi naman ako nagtapos sa UP… Ateneo. Nagtapos ako ng criminology at UP rin: sa University of Prison. Ang batas ay precise, hindi ito puwedeng iba-ibahin o baluktutin. Kung ano ang sinabi lalo ng Saligang Batas ay sana panghawakan natin,” Padilla said.
His central argument was that the person occupying the Senate presidency should be the one to preside over the trial, a position the minority bloc pressed throughout the session’s opening hours.
That contention lost. On a motion by Senator Panfilo Lacson, the court elected Escudero by a count of 12 in favor and eight opposed, according to Rappler and multiple outlets covering the July 6 session. Escudero replaced Senate President Sherwin Gatchalian, who under the chamber’s earlier rules would have taken the chair automatically. Weeks before the trial opened, the Senate revised those rules to permit a member other than the Senate president to preside, provided a majority of those present agree.
Senator Alan Peter Cayetano drove the objection hardest, repeatedly challenging the legality of the arrangement as the vote approached. He warned that acting on rules he considered void placed the entire proceeding on unstable ground. Gatchalian eventually ruled him out of order and directed that his remarks about Escudero’s election be removed from the record.
Padilla was among a group of senator-judges — including Pia Cayetano, Loren Legarda, and Imee Marcos — who spoke against the outcome and characterized it as unconstitutional, per Rolling Stone Philippines.
The clash carried forward a leadership feud that has shadowed the chamber for months. The Cayetano bloc has petitioned the Supreme Court to nullify the Senate’s June 3 session, when 12 senators reorganized the chamber and installed Gatchalian’s leadership. Philstar reported that the Gatchalian side defended the validity of that quorum by invoking the Supreme Court’s 1949 ruling in Avelino v. Cuenco, noting that with Senator Jinggoy Estrada in jail and Senator Ronald dela Rosa evading an International Criminal Court warrant, the working total dropped to 22, making 12 sufficient to constitute a quorum.
This is not Escudero’s first turn in the chair for a Duterte impeachment. He presided when the Senate first convened as an impeachment court in 2025, a process that ended when the chamber voted that August to archive the articles against her. Rappler noted that the minority’s distrust of Escudero traces partly to that period, when critics accused him of reading the Constitution’s “forthwith” directive in a way that stalled the case.
Escudero addressed the court after his election, casting the assignment as a duty rather than something he pursued. “I did not seek nor did I ask for this responsibility. But neither will I shirk from fulfilling this duty without fear or favor,” he told the chamber.
