VP camp wants oral arguments on grave threats case

Philippine Vice President Sara Duterte arrives before the start of the impeachment trial at the Senate of the Philippines in Pasay, Metro Manila on July 7, 2026.

AFP / Noel Celis

MANILA, Philippines — The camp of Vice President Sara Duterte yesterday asked the Quezon City Regional Trial Court (QC RTC) to allow oral arguments on the motion to quash she filed in connection with the grave threats case she is facing.

Duterte’s counsel Paul Lawrence Lim said a manifestation was filed before the lower court, citing “the far-reaching consequences of the grave threats cases.”

Duterte’s camp has also asked the QC RTC to withhold the issuance of a warrant of arrest against the Vice President.

“The deferment of the issuance of the arrest warrant is one of the things we asked the court while the issue of jurisdiction is still pending,” Lim said during a press conference.

The Department of Justice (DOJ) has filed a grave threats case against Duterte for violation of Article 282 of the Revised Penal Code, in relation to Section 6 of Republic Act 10175 or the Cybercrime Prevention Act.

“If a sitting Vice President may be indicted and prosecuted, then other incumbent impeachable officers such as the ombudsman, members of the constitutional commissions, Supreme Court justices and even the President, may also be indicted and prosecuted,” Lim added.

The National Bureau of Investigation filed the complaint for grave threats and inciting to sedition against Duterte in February 2025, which cited her November 2024 remarks during an online press briefing that she had hired someone to kill President Marcos, First Lady Liza Araneta-Marcos and former speaker Martin Romualdez in case she is killed.

In May 2025, Duterte called on the DOJ to dismiss the “false and baseless” complaints against her, saying “being accused of a criminal offense, I am constitutionally presumed innocent even in these proceedings, and need not dignify the complaint with a reply, when no evidence has been shown to support it.”

The DOJ said the inciting to sedition complaint has been dismissed, apparently for lack of evidence.