Magento admin scope choosers show wrong website order after DB import (order ignores store_website.sort_order)

Question

Environment
- Magento (Open Source / Adobe Commerce) 2.4.6
- PHP 8.2; MySQL 8.1
- Same codebase on both instances: Original and Test (no code differences).
- Full DB export from Original → import into a clean schema on Test.

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Problem

After importing the DB into Test, all admin scope choosers (Website/Store/Store View pickers on CMS Pages, Products, Categories, etc.) list websites in a different order than on Original — even though store_website.sort_order is correct and identical.

On Original (expected order):

Admin → Website A → Website B → Website C → ...

On Test (actual order):

Admin → Website B → Website A → Website C → ...

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What I expect

• Websites sorted by store_website.sort_order (ascending).
• Store views sorted by store.sort_order within each Store Group.

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What I verified

1. store_website.sort_order is correct:

   SELECT code, sort_order 
   FROM store_website 
   ORDER BY sort_order, code;
   

   Example result:

   admin 0
   website_a 10
   website_b 20
   website_c 30
   

2. Store views are consistently ordered per group:

   SELECT store_id, group_id, code, name, sort_order
   FROM store
   ORDER BY group_id, sort_order, store_id;
   

3. Store Group names are clean (no leading/trailing spaces or special unicode):

   SELECT group_id, CONCAT('[',name,']') AS bracketed, HEX(name) AS hex
   FROM store_group
   ORDER BY name ASC;
   

4. Default website is set correctly on both envs:

   SELECT website_id, code, is_default, default_group_id
   FROM store_website
   ORDER BY website_id;
   

5. Changing sort_order on Test (e.g., temporarily set one website to 90) does not change the order in the problematic choosers. So those choosers appear to ignore store_website.sort_order.

6. Cleared everything on Test and tried multiple browsers/incognito (no change):

   bin/magento cache:flush
   rm -rf var/cache var/page_cache var/di var/generation var/view_preprocessed
   bin/magento setup:di:compile
   

7. If I emulate a typical core ordering (websites by store_website.sort_order, groups by name/id, stores by store.sort_order), SQL returns the expected order (Website A before Website B):

   SELECT w.sort_order AS website_so, w.name AS website,
    g.name AS group_name, s.sort_order AS storeview_so, s.name AS storeview
   FROM store_website w
   JOIN store_group g ON g.website_id = w.website_id
   JOIN store s ON s.group_id = g.group_id
   ORDER BY w.sort_order, g.name, s.sort_order, s.store_id;
   

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Where it happens

The "wrong" order shows up wherever the admin requires Website/Store/Store View scope selection (CMS Page, Product, Category, etc.). On Original the order is consistent with sort_order. On Test (after import) it isn’t.

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Questions

1. Which class/provider defines the data & sorting for these scope choosers (e.g., CMS Page/Product/Category forms) in Magento 2.x? Is it \Magento\Store\Model\System\Store::getStoreValuesForForm(), and do those choosers rely on collection defaults instead of sort_order?
2. Is there any known post-import condition (cache/config/flag table or generated metadata) that can make these choosers ignore store_website.sort_order on one instance but not the other, even with identical DB data?
3. If those choosers don’t consistently respect store_website.sort_order, what is the recommended core-compatible approach to enforce it globally?

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Repro steps

1. Export DB from Original.
2. Import into a clean schema on Test.
3. Flush caches, clear var/*, recompile.
4. Open any admin form with Website/Store/Store View selector.
5. Observe that the order on Test ≠ Original, even with identical DB data.