Will a planet orbiting a red giant star always be tidally locked?


Not necessarily. If the planet is far enough away from the red giant star, the tidal forces decrease with the cube of the distance, so that at, say, the orbit of Pluto from a solar red giant star as big as the orbit of Venus, tidal locking is not important, and since the star only remains a red giant for a few hundred million years, there may not be enough time for even close-in planets to be fully locked into a 1:1 resonance. For the Sun as a red giant of the size of Venus, Earth and Mars will probably become tidally locked during the Sun's tenure as a red giant star. Jupiter may also be affected. but perhaps not as completely. This kind of calculation can easily be done to find out, but I don't know of anyone who has reported on these matters in the scientific journals.