I feel like when it comes to Musk's motivations it makes sense to just view everything he does as his wanting to make more money.
If you kick people off and keep them off, you can't make money off of them. So it makes sense to have a way of letting people come back on eventually or to tone down suspensions over stupid stuff.
If you censor certain views on the site, then you have certain demographics no longer seeing as many ads (since less incentive to check the site) and they'll also lose any interest in paying a subscription.
Even the stuff about bumping up replies from verifieds (who can pay for it) could be seen as similar to Twitch donations getting read off. It's helping monetize people's interest in interacting with the celebrities on Twitter. Musk has even commented on how Twitter Blue can do 42 minute videos and seemed interested in YouTube's method for monetization.
What makes Musk unique is that he seems interested more in making money than in pushing an ideology, which ends up acting similar to an ideology since it means him rationalizing some of these moves of his as being in the pursuit of free speech.