Filip was politically active at a local level from 1984, when he was elected in a by-election for Members of the Municipal National Committee in České Budějovice.

His mandate as a Member of the Municipal National Committee ended in November 1990, and he later ran successfully for České Budějovice City Council on the KSČM list in 1994, and was re-elected in 1998 and in repeated elections in 1999.

Consequently, a vigorous debate took place about the financing of the trip, and Filip was criticized by the Parliament, who accused him of undermining Czech foreign policy interests and providing the Kremlin with useful propaganda.

[2] In August 2018, around the 50th anniversary of the Prague Spring, Filip commented that Russia should not be held responsible for the invasion, as Leonid Brezhnev and many of the soldiers involved in the military action were from Ukraine.

[3] In 2019, a delegation led by the China Tianjin Communist Party secretary Li Hongzhong visited Prague and met with Filip, along with Jan Hamáček (ČSSD) Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of the Interior, and Radek Vondráček (ANO), President of the Chamber of Deputies.