diff --git a/pyproject.toml b/pyproject.toml
index 2f024dd..e43cab0 100644
--- a/pyproject.toml
+++ b/pyproject.toml
@@ -35,6 +35,10 @@ dev = [
     "pre-commit>=2.0",
     "twine>=4.0",
     "build>=0.6",
+    # setuptools is only necessary because Python 3.12 removed the distutils
+    # package. pyspark 3.5.X still imports this package, so we need it on
+    # Python 3.12 to run the tests and have hlink work at all.
+    "setuptools",
     # These are pinned so tightly because their version numbers appear in the docs.
     # So if you use a different version, it creates a huge diff in the docs.
     # TODO: auto-generate docs on push to GitHub instead of committing them to the