The candidate's top five accomplishments and contributions for the last 15 years or so

Public Office

Hontiveros filed nearly 250 bills during her first term as senator. Among the 17 laws that she authored are the Mental Health Act, the 105-Day Expanded Maternity Leave Law, the Safe Spaces Act and the Universal Healthcare Act

Two laws she principally sponsored, R.A. No. 11148 and R.A. No. 11228, scale up nutrition intervention programs in the first 1,000 days of a child's life and mandate PhilHealth coverage for all persons with disability, respectively.

She was one of two members of the Senate to vote against the controversial Anti-Terrorism Act of 2020.

As chairperson of the Senate Committee on Women, Children, Family Relations and Gender Equality, Hontiveros led a legislative probe on alleged corruption in the Bureau of Immigration which led to the preventative suspension of several officials. The same investigation linked BI officials behind the bribery scheme, also known as the "pastillas" scam, to the outbound trafficking of Filipino women.

In response to the probe's findings, President Rodrigo Duterte claimed in 2020 that he dismissed the immigration officials tagged in the alleged bribery schemes. However, he actually allowed them to return to work once their preventive suspensions lapsed.

In the House of Representatives, Hontiveros filed 134 bills, six of which contributed to the passage of laws that include the Cheaper and Quality Medicines Law and the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program Extension.

Hontiveros has also played a big role in several other legislative investigations, including the probes on the killing of Kian de los Santos and the government's anomalous deals with its favored pandemic supplier Pharmally Pharmaceutical Corp.

Two cases have been filed against Hontiveros by allies of the Duterte administration in connection with the probes.

The first was filed in 2017 by former Justice Secretary Vitaliano Aguirre who claimed that Hontiveros wiretapped him by reading his text messages in a photo of him taken by media during a Senate hearing on Delos Santos, a 17-year-old killed by police during an anti-drug operation. In the text messages, Aguirre appeared to be urging Negros Oriental Rep. Jacinto Paras to expedite legal action against Hontiveros.

Another case was filed against Hontiveros by a Pharmally Pharmaceutical Corp. employee who claimed that Hontiveros bribed one of his colleagues to testify that the firm instructed employees to repackage substandard and expired medical-grade face shields.

However, the same testimony was confirmed by Pharmally officer Krizle Grace Mago shortly after a video recording of it was played at a Senate blue ribbon panel hearing. Mago even went so far as to say that she believed Pharmally was swindling the government by tampering with the face shields.

Both Mago and the witness presented by Hontiveros have since disavowed their own statements that were given under oath. Senators, including Hontiveros, have dismissed the Pharmally employees’ claims that they were pressured to give such testimonies. Mago reversed her own testimony after becoming unreachable to the Senate, which offered her protection following her startling admission, and resurfacing under the protective custody of the House of Representatives.

Senate President Vicente Sotto at the time emphasized that admissions under oath carry more weight than subsequent denials of the same. Hontiveros similarly noted that both testimonies are part of the Senate record regardless of attempts to discredit them.

Hontiveros and other opposition senators have condemned the cases filed against her as retaliatory moves from administration allies.

Private Sector

Before she was a legislator, Hontiveros worked as a neighborhood organizer, peace advocate and award-winning broadcast journalist.