ST. LOUIS-—The political consulting firm for St. Louis Mayor Tishaura Jones confirmed Tuesday that Jones will launch her 2025 re-election campaign next week.

The St. Louis Post-Dispatch first reported the news.

In a message to supporters this week, Jones said “after three years of working hard every single day to show real, tangible results for the people of St. Louis, we have so many amazing things to talk about — and still so much more to do to keep improving our City.”

In 2021, Jones, then the city’s treasurer, defeated Alderwoman Cara Spencer in a general election after both women defeated former aldermanic board President Lewis Reed and Andrew Jones, an executive with the Southwestern Electric Cooperative, in the primary. 

As Mayor, Jones’ administration has been responsible for deploying the city’s $498 million share of federal American Rescue Plan Act funds, with a focus on ending generations of disinvestment in North St. Louis. 

Jones has reshaped the St. Louis Metropolitan Police Department in significant ways, including the elimination of some unfilled positions and replacing them with social service staff who work to divert cases that may not necessarily require a law enforcement response. She also hired the first police chief in the department’s history who came from outside the city when Robert Tracy was named to the post starting in January 2023.

Jones’s election came amid a period of ascension for progressives in the city–Kim Gardner was elected as Circuit Attorney in 2016, Cori Bush upset Rep. Lacy Clay after ten terms in Congress and Megan Green was elected as President of the Board of Aldermen in 2022 after Reed resigned amid a federal bribery indictment.

But there have been tensions. After years of complaints about Gardner’s management of the Circuit Attorney’s office, Jones broke with her ally and questioned whether Gardner should continue in the post early last year when a teenage volleyball player visiting from Tennessee lost the use of her legs in a crash with the driver of a car who had a history of violating bond while awaiting trial on a robbery charge. 

Gardner’s resignation pulled the plug on state legislation last year that would have allowed the Governor to appoint a special prosecutor for violent crime here and would have put SLMPD back under a state-controlled board. There have been renewed efforts this year on the state control front, supported by both of the department’s unions. While the General Assembly ends for the year next week, Jones’ critics in the state legislature are likely to try again next year. Three of the leading GOP candidates for governor have already said they support state control of SLMPD.

Jones has found herself at odds with the Green-led Board of Aldermen over issues related to oversight of the city’s justice center, and guardrails for police use of surveillance tools, among other topics. Jones has not yet issued an endorsement in what is now a heated congressional primary featuring Bush, St. Louis County Prosecuting Attorney Wesley Bell and former state lawmaker Maria Chappelle-Nadal as Bush faces criticism for her criticism of the Israeli government’s policy on Gaza and an ongoing federal investigation into her campaign’s spending on security.  

Jones will launch her campaign Thursday May 17, at Third Degree Glass Factory.