HttpWebRequest.GetResponse() returning Envelope and [CData and Encoded values

I'm am using the HttpWebRequest.GetResponse()  to get an XML file from a client.

The client XML is returned with everything decoded.
The client is returning the Envelope.
The client is returning part of the data inside a [CDATA wrapper. It returns several required elements, then it returns a [CDATA with the remaining elements.

I want to deserialize the data eventually.

If I try to write to an XMLDocument it errors:
XmlDocument xmlResults = new XmlDocument();
                            xmlResults.XmlResolver = null;
                            xmlResults.LoadXml(soapResponseMsg);


I have tried stripping out the Envelope.
Decoding the &lt; and &gt; back to < and >.

But when I deserialize the raw data, it doesn't find the values between the [CDATA so it doesn't deserialize anything within that.

Then I tried stripping out the CDATA, but then it errors, because the client has data within the elements with < and > symbols, so then I get an error:

>Data at the root level is invalid. Line 1, position 1."

<class>GVWR<26001</class>

So it thinks the < symbol above is a command!

I have tried all kinds of encoding tricks.
request.ContentType = "text/xml;charset=\"utf-8\""; // add escaped
request.Accept = "text/xml";

and

Encoding encode = System.Text.Encoding.GetEncoding("utf-8");
using (StreamReader reader = new StreamReader(response.GetResponseStream(), encode))

... hoping there is some setting that will retrieve the XML data with the < > as they should be, but leave the body &lt; as it should.

Is there something?

Thanks!