FACT CHECK: Sotto did not call for VP Sara’s ‘immediate’ conviction without due process

There is no statement or interview on record where Sotto urged the Senate to disregard impeachment trial rules to have Duterte convicted immediately Claim: Senate President Pro Tempore Vicente “Tito” Sotto III said Vice President Sara Duterte “should be convicted immediately” and that the Senate should no longer follow due process in her impeachment trial. Rating: FALSE Why we fact-checked this: A Facebook graphic was posted by user “Eduardo Ortega Jr.” on July 30. It shows a photo of Sotto with overlaid text, implied to be a quote of the senator: “Dapat ma convict na kaagad si VP Sara Duterte, huwag na natin sundin ang rules.” (VP Sara Duterte should be convicted immediately, let’s no longer follow the rules.) As of writing, the post has garnered 9,800 reactions, 5,000 comments, and 240 shares. The facts: There is no interview, official statement, or credible news report of Sotto making this remark. The post also mirrors a recurring pattern of fabricated quote cards involving Sotto related to Duterte’s impeachment. Previous viral posts falsely claimed Sotto had said only 11, and later 14, votes from senator-judges were needed to convict the Vice President. Those claims have been debunked. What Sotto has actually said runs in the opposite direction. As then-Senate president preparing to preside over the trial, he repeatedly stressed that the impeachment process must follow the Constitution and the Senate’s rules — not bypass them. In a May 2 radio interview, Sotto said he saw no shortcomings in the Senate’s impeachment rules and warned that changing them could “becloud the process.” Days later, he reiterated that the Senate was constitutionally bound to convene as an impeachment court once it received the Articles of Impeachment, adding, “Let’s follow the Constitution.” Sotto has likewise maintained that any conviction must meet the Constitution’s two-thirds voting requirement of 16 senator-judges. At the beginning of Duterte’s impeachment trial on July 6, presiding officer Chiz Escudero set the conviction threshold to 16. Sotto’s role: Sotto previously served as Senate president and was set to preside over Duterte’s trial before he was ousted by Senator Alan Peter Cayetano in May 2026. The latter was later replaced by Senator Win Gatchalian following weeks of a power struggle within the upper chamber. During the first impeachment drive against Duterte in 2025, Sotto was among the senators who voted against archiving the articles of impeachment against the Vice President after the Supreme Court struck it down as unconstitutional. At the time, Sotto called the ruling a “sad day for constitutional law” and said it amounted to judicial overreach. – Cyril Bocar/Rappler.com Efren Cyril Bocar is a journalist from Llorente, Eastern Samar who graduated with a degree in English Language Studies at the Visayas State University. Cyril is also a graduate of the Aries Rufo Journalism Fellowship of Rappler for 2024. Keep us aware of suspicious Facebook pages, groups, accounts, websites, articles, or photos in your network by contacting us at factcheck@rappler.com. Let us battle disinformation one Fact Check at a time. How does this make you feel? Loading