It's a garbage habit that they've all fallen into. The quotes will fall away when future stories refer back to this story.

That single quoted phrase was set in the context of other words, and that context defined its meaning. We know this to an extent that almost no one could have imagined since LLMs have become a huge part of the world.

My favorite example of this is how no article in Britain during Corbyn's leadership of the labor party would ever quote an entire sentence that he had said. Thousands of articles, and the quotes were all fragmentary phrases and lone words framed in editorial.

edit: Brits and the BBC especially do this more than most, likely because of their bizarre libel laws (that were once even worse than they are now.)