Yes I expected that argument. My point was there was no valid reason to remove them. The xz case didn't convince any other projects to get rid of maintainers based on their nationality after all.

It's obviously my own opinion that what Linus did was an nonnegotiable red flag but I'd prefer to stick with it for now. I guess making this discussion political was a pretty harmful decision so I'll remove some of my replies in order to avoid creating more drama.