diff --git a/agent/chat_completion_helpers.py b/agent/chat_completion_helpers.py
index 38cb66f53c..11701d317a 100644
--- a/agent/chat_completion_helpers.py
+++ b/agent/chat_completion_helpers.py
@@ -262,17 +262,11 @@ def _provider_stream_error_from_json_decode_error(error: json.JSONDecodeError, *
 
 
 def _is_provider_stream_empty_frame_error(exc: BaseException) -> bool:
-    """True for a contentless SSE frame: either the translated ``ProviderStreamError`` carrying
-    the empty-frame code, or the SDK's raw ``JSONDecodeError`` with an empty ``doc`` (belt for
-    iteration sites that surface it without translation — ``json.loads`` only ever sees an
-    empty document when the frame carried no payload). A malformed payload is neither: its
-    ``doc`` holds the offending text. Re-streaming cannot help either way — a degraded gateway
-    answers every stream that way — so the caller must change channel."""
+    """True for the translated contentless-SSE-frame error. Re-streaming cannot help
+    (a degraded gateway answers every stream that way), so the caller must change channel."""
     body = getattr(exc, "body", None)
     error_obj = body.get("error") if isinstance(body, dict) else None
-    if isinstance(error_obj, dict) and error_obj.get("code") == PROVIDER_STREAM_EMPTY_FRAME_ERROR_CODE:
-        return True
-    return isinstance(exc, json.JSONDecodeError) and not str(getattr(exc, "doc", "") or "").strip()
+    return isinstance(error_obj, dict) and error_obj.get("code") == PROVIDER_STREAM_EMPTY_FRAME_ERROR_CODE
 
 
 def _iter_provider_stream_chunks(stream, *, response: Any = None):
diff --git a/agent/error_classifier.py b/agent/error_classifier.py
index 82f93d0965..47bed99af5 100644
--- a/agent/error_classifier.py
+++ b/agent/error_classifier.py
@@ -495,9 +495,6 @@ _ERROR_CODE_VERDICTS: Dict[str, Verdict] = {
     **dict.fromkeys(("context_length_exceeded", "max_tokens_exceeded"), _V_CONTEXT_OVERFLOW),
     **dict.fromkeys(_MEMORY_CEILING_ERROR_CODES, _V_OVERLOADED),
     "invalid_encrypted_content": _V_INVALID_ENCRYPTED,
-    # An empty SSE keepalive frame: the retry it triggers is issued non-streaming
-    # (``_maybe_disable_streaming``), so the turn can still complete — never a format error.
-    PROVIDER_STREAM_EMPTY_FRAME_ERROR_CODE: _V_UNKNOWN,
 }
 
 # Generic ``invalid_request_error`` is deliberately NOT a 400 validation