Satire: The 32 Million Vote Immunity Doctrine

As we saw on the opening day of Vice President Sara Duterte's impeachment trial, lead defense counsel Atty. Shiela Sison rolled out a breathtaking legal defense.

She argued that attempting to unseat the Vice President would be an insult to the historic, unparalleled 32.2 million Filipinos who voted for her in 2022.

It is an absolutely spectacular legal theory. Forget the Constitution, forget the Bill of Rights, and forget standard accounting principles.

According to this groundbreaking logic, if you manage to accumulate 32 million checkmarks on a ballot, you don’t just win a temporary government job—you unlock a real-life Grand Theft Auto cheat code for absolute immunity.

Let us marvel at the incredible list of perks that apparently come bundled with this magical 32-million-vote package:

A. -Standard Criminal / Impeachable Act - Grave Threats & Assassination Fantasies - (Publicly announcing an order to have the sitting President, First Lady, and House Speaker assassinated if you get taken out.)

-The "32 Million Votes" Exemption Clause - Permitted. It’s not a national security threat; it’s just passionate, high-stakes creative storytelling. The 32 million voted for "Authenticity," and what is more authentic than a casual death threat over a press conference microphone?

B. Standard Criminal / Impeachable Act - The 11-Day Flash-Burn (Blowing through ₱125 million in confidential funds in a record-shattering 11 days.

-The "32 Million Votes" Exemption Clause - Authorized Speedrun. Spending public money at a rate of ₱11 million a day isn’t a regular audit nightmare—it's economic efficiency! When you have 32 million fans, you don't have time for slow, boring line-item liquidations.

C. -Standard Criminal / Impeachable Act - SALN Creative Writing (Amassing unexplained wealth manifestly disproportionate to your lawful income.)

-The "32 Million Votes" Exemption Clause - A Minor Math Error. If you can count up to 32 million votes, your personal Statement of Assets, Liabilities, and Net Worth (SALN) is allowed to have a few stray zeros and unlisted properties. It’s called "poetic license."

D. Standard Criminal / Impeachable Act - The DepEd Envelope Lottery (Allegedly distributing envelopes filled with cash to Department of Education officials to bypass procurement laws.)

-The "32 Million Votes" Exemption Clause - Spiritual Subsidies. It isn't bribery; it’s a localized, hand-delivered financial stimulus package for underpaid officials! Surely, the 32 million voters want their education department to run on a direct cash-and-carry basis.

E. Standard Criminal / Impeachable Act - The ₱600 Million Vault Burner (The total systematic liquidation and alleged misuse of over ₱600 million across the OVP and DepEd.)

-The "32 Million Votes" Exemption Clause - Pre-Approved Expense. The defense implies that when people voted for the VP, they signed a blank check. If ₱600 million disappears into the "confidential" void, that's just the price of democracy.

As House prosecution spokesperson Ace Barbers dryly pointed out the next morning, the framers of the 1987 Constitution must be scratching their heads in the afterlife.

They naively thought impeachment was built into Article XI precisely to protect the public from high-ranking abuses of power.

But the defense has corrected them. The new formula is beautifully simple:

Total Crimes Committed - 32.2 Million Votes = Absolute Innocence

By this logic, popularity is the ultimate sanitizer. If a barangay treasurer pocketed ₱10,000, they would be thrown into a local holding cell before sunset because they only got 500 votes.

But if you allegedly misplace ₱600 million of the people's money? Well, you have 32 million voters acting as human shields, so the law isn't allowed to touch you.

The funniest part of this "disenfranchisement" narrative is who the actual victims are.

The defense claims that impeaching Sara insults her voters. But if the prosecution's allegations are true—that hundreds of millions of taxpayer pesos were systematically misspent—then the money that allegedly vanished belonged to the very same 32 million people who stood in line under the hot sun to vote for her.

Apparently, the ultimate expression of loyalty expected from the 32 million is to proudly watch your own wallet get lifted, smile at the camera, and say, "It’s okay, she’s bloodied but unbowed!"

(Thanks to the owner of the image used above)