This is an old thread, but I'm posting a solution in case it's helpful for others who stumble upon this weird error. I'm using VS2022 and began seeing this just on OPENING Visual Studio -- well before opening any solution. I eventually found that my issue was a corrupt extension (@#%$#%@!). For me, it was my "AWS Toolkit with Amazon Q" extension which needed to be uninstalled/reinstalled. But for any extension issues, just open Visual Studio in safe mode ("devenv /SafeMode") and view your Extensions (Installed ones). Then remove any potential culprits to see if they were the issue (ie. remove one, close/reopen VS normally to see if it helped, repeat as needed). Anyways, just posting this in case it helps a fellow developer in the future. :)