diff --git a/common/lib/capa/capa/util.py b/common/lib/capa/capa/util.py
index 261332224b..f7d8f5b466 100644
--- a/common/lib/capa/capa/util.py
+++ b/common/lib/capa/capa/util.py
@@ -193,7 +193,7 @@ def get_inner_html_from_xpath(xpath_node):
 
     """
     # returns string from xpath node
-    html = etree.tostring(xpath_node).strip()
+    html = etree.tostring(xpath_node).strip().decode('utf-8')
     # strips outer tag from html string
     # xss-lint: disable=python-interpolate-html
     inner_html = re.sub('(?ms)<%s[^>]*>(.*)</%s>' % (xpath_node.tag, xpath_node.tag), '\\1', html)