diff --git a/lib/galaxy/web/framework/middleware/error.py b/lib/galaxy/web/framework/middleware/error.py
index 86e1738efe7..93daa1c1c36 100644
--- a/lib/galaxy/web/framework/middleware/error.py
+++ b/lib/galaxy/web/framework/middleware/error.py
@@ -267,7 +267,7 @@ class CatchingIter:
             if not self.start_checker.response_started:
                 self.start_checker("500 Internal Server Error", [("content-type", "text/html")], exc_info)
 
-            return response
+            return response.encode("utf-8", errors="ignore")
 
     def close(self):
         # This should at least print something to stderr if the
diff --git a/lib/galaxy/web/framework/middleware/profile.py b/lib/galaxy/web/framework/middleware/profile.py
index 672c90d4154..7bfeed86907 100644
--- a/lib/galaxy/web/framework/middleware/profile.py
+++ b/lib/galaxy/web/framework/middleware/profile.py
@@ -67,7 +67,7 @@ class ProfileMiddleware:
         prof = cProfile.Profile()
         prof.runctx("run_app()", globals(), locals())
         # Build up body with stats
-        body = "".join(body)
+        body = b"".join(body)
         headers = catch_response[1]
         content_type = response.header_value(headers, "content-type")
         if not content_type.startswith("text/html"):
@@ -77,7 +77,7 @@ class ProfileMiddleware:
         stats.strip_dirs()
         stats.sort_stats("time", "calls")
         output = pstats_as_html(stats, self.limit)
-        body += template % output
+        body += (template % output).encode("utf-8")
         return [body]
 
 
diff --git a/lib/galaxy/web/framework/middleware/static.py b/lib/galaxy/web/framework/middleware/static.py
index 432c6084189..b7f9da7b85f 100644
--- a/lib/galaxy/web/framework/middleware/static.py
+++ b/lib/galaxy/web/framework/middleware/static.py
@@ -54,7 +54,7 @@ class CacheableStaticURLParser(StaticURLParser):
                 headers: list[tuple[str, str]] = []
                 ETAG.update(headers, mytime)
                 start_response("304 Not Modified", headers)
-                return [""]  # empty body
+                return [b""]  # empty body
         app = FileApp(full)
         if self.cache_seconds:
             app.cache_control(max_age=int(self.cache_seconds))