diff --git a/changes/19290-fix-make-slice-with-capacity b/changes/19290-fix-make-slice-with-capacity
new file mode 100644
index 000000000000..27770b1bfe42
--- /dev/null
+++ b/changes/19290-fix-make-slice-with-capacity
@@ -0,0 +1 @@
+* Fixed a code linter issue where a slice was created non-empty and appended-to, instead of empty with the required capacity.
diff --git a/server/datastore/mysql/microsoft_mdm.go b/server/datastore/mysql/microsoft_mdm.go
index 15c2b1c1421a..f8035b1bd2ec 100644
--- a/server/datastore/mysql/microsoft_mdm.go
+++ b/server/datastore/mysql/microsoft_mdm.go
@@ -416,7 +416,7 @@ func updateMDMWindowsHostProfileStatusFromResponseDB(
 		WHERE host_uuid = ? AND command_uuid IN (?)`
 
 	// grab command UUIDs to find matching entries using `getMatchingHostProfilesStmt`
-	commandUUIDs := make([]string, len(payloads))
+	commandUUIDs := make([]string, 0, len(payloads))
 	// also grab the payloads keyed by the command uuid, so we can easily
 	// grab the corresponding `Detail` and `Status` from the matching
 	// command later on.