diff --git a/unstructured/embed/openai.py b/unstructured/embed/openai.py
index ad97c49d98..2352e84341 100644
--- a/unstructured/embed/openai.py
+++ b/unstructured/embed/openai.py
@@ -60,8 +60,6 @@ def embed_documents(self, elements: List[Element]) -> List[Element]:
 
     def _add_embeddings_to_elements(self, elements, embeddings) -> List[Element]:
         assert len(elements) == len(embeddings)
-        elements_w_embedding = []
         for i, element in enumerate(elements):
             element.embeddings = embeddings[i]
-            elements_w_embedding.append(element)
         return elements