HUMAN rights lawyer and legal scholar Arnedo Valera warned that blanket condemnations of red-tagging could weaken the State’s ability to confront insurgency, noting that there is a critical constitutional distinction between protected dissent and armed political violence. Valera said the Constitution safeguards free speech, association, and advocacy but does not extend protection to armed rebellion or parallel political authority enforced through violence. “The Constitution protects dissent, but it does not sanctify armed overthrow,” he added, stressing that the issue was not a contest between government and opposition but a question of preserving Constitutional order amid a decades-long insurgency. Valera said controversy surrounding alleged “legal fronts” of the communist movement could not be dismissed outright as mere military invention, noting that the concept had been historically articulated by Communist Party of the Philippines founder Jose Maria Sison as part of a strategy combining armed struggle with legal-democratic work. He clarified that acknowledging this history did not justify branding all activist organizations as insurgent-linked, which he said would be unconstitutional. However, he cautioned that denying the existence of a legal-democratic component within revolutionary strategy, despite historical records, deprived the public of an honest discussion. According to Valera, the key constitutional question was determining when lawful advocacy crossed into political support for armed rebellion — a line he said should be assessed through evidence and conduct rather than slogans or sweeping accusations. Valera also criticized what he described as a growing tendency among some groups to distance themselves from armed struggle while refusing to denounce it outright. He said statements claiming to reject violence while “respecting” armed struggle created strategic ambiguity rather than neutrality. “In a constitutional republic, that posture is not neutral,” he said, arguing that peaceful reformers had no reason to hedge on their rejection of violent overthrow and that ambiguity had historically been used by revolutionary movements to preserve legal space while advancing non-legal objectives. He emphasized that the Philippine Constitution recognized only one sovereignty and one political authority, rejecting the notion of co-equal armed political entities. Treating armed struggle as a legitimate political option, he said, trivialized decades of violence that had claimed the lives of soldiers, civilians, Indigenous leaders, local officials, and activists. While affirming Supreme Court rulings cautioning against reckless red-tagging that endangers life and liberty, Valera said such doctrines were not intended to paralyze the State’s counter-insurgency mandate. He called for “discipline” in evidence, language, and process, urging authorities to investigate acts rather than associations, prosecute crimes rather than opinions, and protect peaceful activists while confronting material support for armed groups. Valera said organizations asserting they were legal and constitutional should have no difficulty issuing a categorical rejection of armed struggle, affirming constitutional means as the sole path to change, and committing not to provide political, logistical, or recruitment support to armed movements. “These are not military demands,” he wrote. “They are constitutional minimums.” Valera also defended the Armed Forces of the Philippines and the National Task Force to End Local Communist Armed Conflict (NTF-Elcac), saying they operated under civilian authority and were tasked with ending a conflict that had persisted for more than 50 years. He acknowledged the need for oversight and accountability but warned against portraying counter-insurgency efforts as inherently unconstitutional, arguing that doing so left communities vulnerable and benefited insurgent groups. “The Philippines does not need more labels. It needs clarity,” Valera said, calling for clear protection of peaceful dissent, unequivocal rejection of armed overthrow, and recognition of security institutions as instruments of democratic survival when restrained by law. Valera is a New York-licensed attorney and Philippine lawyer who has served as an independent legal consultant during peace talks between the Philippine government and the CPP–NPA–NDF. He is also a law professor, columnist, and managing attorney of a US-based immigration and anti-discrimination law firm.