This is pretty offensive. Is the purpose cruelty or provocation?

Cruelty. It's always the cruelty.

https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2018/10/the-cruelt... | https://archive.today/NjiSx

It's just plain money-grubbing.

list one form of punishment that is not cruel

fining people a fine that can afford while still impacting their lifestyle negativity enough that they actually notice, without forcing them to go hungry or homeless.

Cruelty. The motivating force of the modern Republican party is identify the "other" and then hurt them.

It's also to add more bad noise to try to distract from the major damage they're doing. They've specifically outlined this. Overwhelm the "enemy" - in this case non-MAGA - with bad stuff so they can't focus on anything.