diff --git a/app/services/content_scrubber.rb b/app/services/content_scrubber.rb
index f517dbda89..7305aecf7e 100644
--- a/app/services/content_scrubber.rb
+++ b/app/services/content_scrubber.rb
@@ -10,6 +10,14 @@ class ContentScrubber < Rails::Html::PermitScrubber
     self.attributes = ALLOWED_ATTRIBUTES
   end
 
+  def scrub(node)
+    if node.name == 'p' && (node.children.empty? || node.text.blank?)
+      node.remove
+    else
+      super
+    end
+  end
+
   def skip_node?(node)
     node.text?
   end
diff --git a/spec/services/content_sanitizer_spec.rb b/spec/services/content_sanitizer_spec.rb
index 8e2117c1e8..6961d8e574 100644
--- a/spec/services/content_sanitizer_spec.rb
+++ b/spec/services/content_sanitizer_spec.rb
@@ -53,5 +53,9 @@ describe ContentSanitizer do
     it "echos nil if given nil" do
       expect(service.sanitize_content(nil)).to be(nil)
     end
+
+    it "removes empty <p> tags and keeps non-empty ones" do
+      expect(service.sanitize_content("<p> </p><p></p><p><b></b><p>hello</p><p></p><p>world!</p>")).to eq("<p>hello</p><p>world!</p>")
+    end
   end
 end