diff --git a/src/ports/postgres/modules/utilities/group_control.py_in b/src/ports/postgres/modules/utilities/group_control.py_in
index 76cdd1c..03d3477 100644
--- a/src/ports/postgres/modules/utilities/group_control.py_in
+++ b/src/ports/postgres/modules/utilities/group_control.py_in
@@ -167,7 +167,7 @@
                 # convert group values to string objects
                 for index, each_grp in enumerate(group_vector):
                     if not each_grp or each_grp.lower() == 'null':
-                        # NULL values should be outputed as NULL instead of 
+                        # NULL values should be outputed as NULL instead of
                         # as a string 'NULL'
                         groups_as_str[index] = "NULL::text"
                     else:
diff --git a/src/ports/postgres/modules/utilities/utilities.py_in b/src/ports/postgres/modules/utilities/utilities.py_in
index dba1a24..14ec082 100644
--- a/src/ports/postgres/modules/utilities/utilities.py_in
+++ b/src/ports/postgres/modules/utilities/utilities.py_in
@@ -43,7 +43,7 @@
     for m in re.finditer(r"(\"(\\\"|[^\"])*\"|[^\",\s]+)", s):
         elm.append(m.group(1))
     for i in range(len(elm)):
-        elm[i] = elm[i].strip()
+        elm[i] = elm[i].strip("\"")
     return elm
 
 ## ========================================================================