[Python] Matplotlib invalid syntax (__init__.py, line 3) when importing matplotlib as mpl

I installed matplotlib using pip install matplotlib, and I'm trying to import it but when I run my script I'm getting a syntax error in the __init__.py (line 3). Here's my code and the error I'm getting. I'm running python 3.10.4 and matplotlib 3.5.3.

import matplotlib as mpl
import matplotlib.pyplot as plt
import numpy as np


Exception has occurred: SyntaxError
invalid syntax (__init__.py, line 3)
File "C:\path\to\my\script.py", line 1, in <module>
import matplotlib as mpl


First few lines of __init__.py of matplotlib are:

"""
An object-oriented plotting library.

A procedural interface is provided by the companion pyplot module,
which may be imported directly, e.g.::

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