diff --git a/tests/nwfilterxml2firewalltest.c b/tests/nwfilterxml2firewalltest.c
index 75a70e9972..33ba8b9932 100644
--- a/tests/nwfilterxml2firewalltest.c
+++ b/tests/nwfilterxml2firewalltest.c
@@ -370,9 +370,6 @@ static int testCompareXMLToArgvFiles(const char *xml,
 
     virCommandSetDryRun(dryRunToken, &buf, true, true, NULL, NULL);
 
-    if (!vars)
-        goto cleanup;
-
     if (testSetDefaultParameters(vars) < 0)
         goto cleanup;