diff --git a/Misc/NEWS b/Misc/NEWS
index 85238f66742..7880adb2b70 100644
--- a/Misc/NEWS
+++ b/Misc/NEWS
@@ -52,6 +52,8 @@ Core and Builtins
 Library
 -------
 
+- Issue #18549: Eliminate dead code in socket_ntohl()
+
 - Issue #18514: Fix unreachable Py_DECREF() call in PyCData_FromBaseObj()
 
 - Issue #18513: Fix behaviour of cmath.rect w.r.t. signed zeros on OS X 10.8 +
diff --git a/Modules/socketmodule.c b/Modules/socketmodule.c
index 2c8a29cc929..1202d38693b 100644
--- a/Modules/socketmodule.c
+++ b/Modules/socketmodule.c
@@ -4702,8 +4702,6 @@ socket_ntohl(PyObject *self, PyObject *arg)
         return PyErr_Format(PyExc_TypeError,
                             "expected int/long, %s found",
                             Py_TYPE(arg)->tp_name);
-    if (x == (unsigned long) -1 && PyErr_Occurred())
-        return NULL;
     return PyLong_FromUnsignedLong(ntohl(x));
 }