Recount confirms St. Louis City Sheriff primary election result

ST. LOUIS – The St. Louis Board of Election Commissioners on Wednesday certified the recount in the race for city sheriff.

The recount confirms incumbent Vernon Betts’ loss in the Democratic primary to challenger Alfred Montgomery.

The Board of Election Commissioners published official election results from the Aug. 6, 2024 primary election on August 19, which showed that Betts narrowly lost.

Days later, Betts formally requested a recount of primary election results. The Board of Election Commissioners was ordered to conduct an “automatic machine recount” of the votes.

The votes were retabulated late Wednesday morning, showing both candidates lost some votes. The prior result showed Montgomery up by 256 votes over Betts. The recount narrowed Montgomery’s victory to just 221 votes.

“I’m glad that the recount is over. I relived election day for two days….we did experience another victory within a month. The people of St. Louis City has spoken, the votes have been tallied up once again, and the results have not changed. I am and will be the next sheriff of the City of St. Louis,” Montgomery said.

The Democratic director of the Board of Elections stated a recount is a rarity.

“I’ve been here since 2020. There’s been only one other recount since I’ve been here—it was a committeewoman race back in 2020. I’ve not experienced anything that would give me any pause in what the results we released on election day,” Benjamin Borgmeyer said.

Betts has held the office of St. Louis City Sheriff on the Democratic ticket since Jan. 1, 2017. In the August 2020 primary , Betts defeated Montgomery with a 61% to 27% advantage in election results.

No Republican candidates ran for the office of St. Louis City Sheriff. Whoever emerges from the recount will face independent candidate Joy Denise Dabney for the office in the Nov. 5, 2024 election.

FOX 2 has reached out to Betts for comment, but have not received a response as of Wednesday night.

CORRECTION: A prior version of the story was the wrong last name to identify Sheriff Betts. We regret the error.

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