Attempting to uninstall a package. How to I get around "The operation would result in removing the following protected packages: dnf"?

edit

I tried that, but got the same error.

I will modify my answer.

I am not convinced that python3 requires python3-pip. On a new install of Fedora 28, python3 is installed, but python3-pip is not. It has to be installed manually.

rpm says it does: Maybe that is a bug.

# rpm -qR python3
libc.so.6()(64bit)
libc.so.6(GLIBC_2.2.5)(64bit)
libc.so.6(GLIBC_2.3.4)(64bit)
libdl.so.2()(64bit)
libm.so.6()(64bit)
libpthread.so.0()(64bit)
libpython3.6m.so.1.0()(64bit)
libutil.so.1()(64bit)
python3-libs(x86-64) = 3.6.5-1.fc28
python3-pip                                     <<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<
python3-setuptools

I found a bug report (1516427) requesting that python3-pip and python3-setuptools be changed from required to recommended. There has been some discussion and the resolution so far is wait to see what comments are provided. One of the comments states that even if they go ahead with this change, the change will be low priority, which of course means it will probably never be done.

At least I now know why I can't remove python3-pip and that it will likely remain that way.