diff --git a/src/pybind/mgr/dashboard/controllers/saml2.py b/src/pybind/mgr/dashboard/controllers/saml2.py
index d16ab7da5a8cb..1599b6df4217b 100644
--- a/src/pybind/mgr/dashboard/controllers/saml2.py
+++ b/src/pybind/mgr/dashboard/controllers/saml2.py
@@ -69,7 +69,7 @@ def auth_response(self, **kwargs):
 
             token = JwtManager.gen_token(username)
             JwtManager.set_user(JwtManager.decode_token(token))
-            token = token.decode('utf-8')
+            token = token.decode('utf-8') if isinstance(token, bytes) else token
             self._set_token_cookie(url_prefix, token)
             raise cherrypy.HTTPRedirect("{}/#/login?access_token={}".format(url_prefix, token))