I'm not sure how you can accuse me of both scare quoting, and actual quoting the same word at the same time.

And he has listed in his contract that he can publish without editorial oversight. The emails from the editor are very clearly are drawing a hard line that certain themes won't be publishable, in contrast to his contractual rights. Him taking offense to that is the basis for them claiming that he's having a "tantrum".

It's very clearly about contracts.