diff --git a/.github/workflows/ci.yml b/.github/workflows/ci.yml
index 74ba34c6fe3..024ff355de5 100644
--- a/.github/workflows/ci.yml
+++ b/.github/workflows/ci.yml
@@ -42,7 +42,7 @@ jobs:
               - "src/pip/_vendor/**"
               - "pyproject.toml"
             tests:
-              # Anything that's touching testable stuff
+              # Anything that's touching code-related stuff
               - ".github/workflows/ci.yml"
               - "src/**"
               - "tests/**"
diff --git a/noxfile.py b/noxfile.py
index 85fccf180a2..5d5f426c564 100644
--- a/noxfile.py
+++ b/noxfile.py
@@ -110,7 +110,14 @@ def test(session: nox.Session) -> None:
     # Run the tests
     #   LC_CTYPE is set to get UTF-8 output inside of the subprocesses that our
     #   tests use.
-    session.run("pytest", *arguments, env={"LC_CTYPE": "en_US.UTF-8"})
+    session.run(
+        "pytest",
+        *arguments,
+        env={
+            "LC_CTYPE": "en_US.UTF-8",
+            "SETUPTOOLS_USE_DISTUTILS": "stdlib",
+        },
+    )
 
 
 @nox.session