diff --git a/econml/dml/causal_forest.py b/econml/dml/causal_forest.py
index e62558e70..d9d341835 100644
--- a/econml/dml/causal_forest.py
+++ b/econml/dml/causal_forest.py
@@ -22,7 +22,6 @@
 from .._cate_estimator import LinearCateEstimator
 from .._shap import _shap_explain_multitask_model_cate
 from .._ortho_learner import _OrthoLearner
-from ..score import RScorer
 
 
 class _CausalForestFinalWrapper:
@@ -511,6 +510,8 @@ def __init__(self, *,
                  n_jobs=-1,
                  random_state=None,
                  verbose=0):
+        from ..score import RScorer
+
 
         # TODO: consider whether we need more care around stateful featurizers,
         #       since we clone it and fit separate copies