(Justin)
Tech nerd from Sweden
Isn’t this more of a local government thing than a national government thing, as the national government already requires exit visas to leave the country?
If the local government takes your passport, they’re ensuring that you can’t go to the national government and get an exit visa, presumably to protect their labor supply or something.
Xi Jinping and his cronies aren’t exactly champions of human rights so I imagine they wouldn’t care either way. They would probably only step in if they were taking passports from party members or there were massive protests like during covid.