diff --git a/Misc/NEWS.d/next/Library/2024-06-07-11-23-31.gh-issue-71587.IjFajE.rst b/Misc/NEWS.d/next/Library/2024-06-07-11-23-31.gh-issue-71587.IjFajE.rst
new file mode 100644
index 00000000000000..50a662977993f5
--- /dev/null
+++ b/Misc/NEWS.d/next/Library/2024-06-07-11-23-31.gh-issue-71587.IjFajE.rst
@@ -0,0 +1,2 @@
+Fix crash in C version of :meth:`datetime.datetime.strptime` when called again
+on the restarted interpreter.
diff --git a/Modules/_datetimemodule.c b/Modules/_datetimemodule.c
index 8552e42d8be5ee..5a062b9c8c0e2c 100644
--- a/Modules/_datetimemodule.c
+++ b/Modules/_datetimemodule.c
@@ -5209,19 +5209,19 @@ datetime_utcfromtimestamp(PyObject *cls, PyObject *args)
 static PyObject *
 datetime_strptime(PyObject *cls, PyObject *args)
 {
-    static PyObject *module = NULL;
-    PyObject *string, *format;
+    PyObject *string, *format, *result;
 
     if (!PyArg_ParseTuple(args, "UU:strptime", &string, &format))
         return NULL;
 
+    PyObject *module = PyImport_ImportModule("_strptime");
     if (module == NULL) {
-        module = PyImport_ImportModule("_strptime");
-        if (module == NULL)
-            return NULL;
+        return NULL;
     }
-    return PyObject_CallMethodObjArgs(module, &_Py_ID(_strptime_datetime),
-                                         cls, string, format, NULL);
+    result = PyObject_CallMethodObjArgs(module, &_Py_ID(_strptime_datetime),
+                                        cls, string, format, NULL);
+    Py_DECREF(module);
+    return result;
 }
 
 /* Return new datetime from date/datetime and time arguments. */
diff --git a/Tools/c-analyzer/cpython/globals-to-fix.tsv b/Tools/c-analyzer/cpython/globals-to-fix.tsv
index b47393e6fdd36a..ac60ee4e1416a7 100644
--- a/Tools/c-analyzer/cpython/globals-to-fix.tsv
+++ b/Tools/c-analyzer/cpython/globals-to-fix.tsv
@@ -422,7 +422,6 @@ Modules/_ctypes/_ctypes.c	CreateSwappedType	suffix	-
 Modules/_ctypes/_ctypes.c	-	_unpickle	-
 Modules/_ctypes/_ctypes.c	PyCArrayType_from_ctype	cache	-
 Modules/_cursesmodule.c	-	ModDict	-
-Modules/_datetimemodule.c	datetime_strptime	module	-
 Modules/_datetimemodule.c	-	PyDateTime_TimeZone_UTC	-
 Modules/_datetimemodule.c	-	PyDateTime_Epoch	-
 Modules/_datetimemodule.c	-	us_per_ms	-