diff --git a/Lib/xml/dom/pulldom.py b/Lib/xml/dom/pulldom.py
index 81a36b073e8..d5ac8b2b984 100644
--- a/Lib/xml/dom/pulldom.py
+++ b/Lib/xml/dom/pulldom.py
@@ -326,7 +326,7 @@ def parse(stream_or_string, parser=None, bufsize=None):
     if bufsize is None:
         bufsize = default_bufsize
     if isinstance(stream_or_string, str):
-        stream = open(stream_or_string)
+        stream = open(stream_or_string, 'rb')
     else:
         stream = stream_or_string
     if not parser:
diff --git a/Misc/NEWS b/Misc/NEWS
index 3007cdc82e5..7e2831a11c6 100644
--- a/Misc/NEWS
+++ b/Misc/NEWS
@@ -209,6 +209,9 @@ Core and Builtins
 Library
 -------
 
+- Issue #12451: xml.dom.pulldom: parse() now opens files in binary mode instead
+  of the text mode (using the locale encoding) to avoid encoding issues.
+
 - Issue #12147: Adjust the new-in-3.2 smtplib.send_message method for better
   conformance to the RFCs:  correctly handle Sender and Resent- headers.