Why does the name of my Publish Profile affect the transformation of my Web.config?

Question

I think I have encountered a strange interaction where the name of my Publish Profile is affecting the contents of the published Web.config.

For context, I have 2 solution configurations; Release & Staging, and a folder Publish Profile called 'Release.pubxml'. Below are stripped down versions of the three web configs involved.

Web.config:

<configuration>
    <connectionStrings>
        <add name="DBEntities" connectionString="{Web.config connection string}" />
    </connectionStrings>
    <appSettings>
        <add key="WEBSITEURL" value="http://website.com" />
        <add key="ADMINURL" value="http://admin.website.com" />
    </appSettings>
</configuration>

Web.Release.config:

<configuration xmlns:xdt="http://schemas.microsoft.com/XML-Document-Transform">
    <connectionStrings>
        <add xdt:Transform="SetAttributes" xdt:Locator="Match(name)" name="DBEntities" connectionString="{Web.Release.config connection string}" />
    </connectionStrings>
    <system.web>
        <compilation xdt:Transform="RemoveAttributes(debug)" />
    </system.web>
    <system.webServer>
        <rewrite xdt:Transform="Insert">
            <rules>
                <rule name="HTTPtoHTTPSredirect" stopProcessing="true">
                    <match url="(.*)" />
                    <conditions>
                        <add input="{HTTPS}" pattern="off" ignoreCase="true" />
                    </conditions>
                    <action type="Redirect" redirectType="Found" url="https://{HTTP_HOST}/{R:1}" />
                </rule>
            </rules>
        </rewrite>
    </system.webServer>
</configuration>

Web.Staging.config:

<configuration xmlns:xdt="http://schemas.microsoft.com/XML-Document-Transform">
    <connectionStrings>
        <add xdt:Transform="SetAttributes" xdt:Locator="Match(name)" name="DBEntities" connectionString="{Web.Staging.config connection string}" />
    </connectionStrings>
    <appSettings>
        <add xdt:Transform="SetAttributes" xdt:Locator="Match(key)" key="WEBSITEURL"  value="http://stagingwebsite.com" />
        <add xdt:Transform="SetAttributes" xdt:Locator="Match(key)"  key="ADMINURL" value="http://admin.stagingwebsite.com />
    </appSettings>
    <system.web>
        <compilation xdt:Transform="RemoveAttributes(debug)" />
    </system.web>
</configuration>

I had recently adjusted our Staging web config, and tried publishing under the Release.pubxml profile, but with the Configuration set to Staging, rather than Release. The result I expected was the original Web.config file, with all Web.Staging.config xdt transformations applied.

What ended up happening was a Frankenstein mix of the Web.Staging.config and the Web.Release.config transforming into Web.config:

<configuration xmlns:xdt="http://schemas.microsoft.com/XML-Document-Transform">
<connectionStrings>
    <add xdt:Transform="SetAttributes" xdt:Locator="Match(name)" name="DBEntities" connectionString="{Web.Release.config connection string}" />
</connectionStrings>
    <appSettings>
        <add xdt:Transform="SetAttributes" xdt:Locator="Match(key)" key="WEBSITEURL"  value="http://stagingwebsite.com" />
        <add xdt:Transform="SetAttributes" xdt:Locator="Match(key)"  key="ADMINURL" value="http://admin.stagingwebsite.com />
    </appSettings>
    <system.web>
        <compilation xdt:Transform="RemoveAttributes(debug)" />
    </system.web>
    <system.webServer>
        <rewrite xdt:Transform="Insert">
            <rules>
                <rule name="HTTPtoHTTPSredirect" stopProcessing="true">
                    <match url="(.*)" />
                    <conditions>
                        <add input="{HTTPS}" pattern="off" ignoreCase="true" />
                    </conditions>
                    <action type="Redirect" redirectType="Found" url="https://{HTTP_HOST}/{R:1}" />
                </rule>
            </rules>
        </rewrite>
    </system.webServer>
</configuration>

You'll notice it has the Release connection string, the Staging WEBSITEURL/ADMINURL, and the Release HTTP rules.

I could not find any trace of the Release configuration anywhere in my settings. I had checked the configuration manager and all projects were set to build as Staging & I had cleaned/rebuilt multiple times. I had also tested it with both VS 2022 & VS 2019, and with multiple, separate solutions; each yielded the same result.

What ended up "fixing" it, was changing the name from 'Release.pubxml' to anything but Release.pubxml or Staging.pubxml. Although you wouldn't usually want to name your publish profile anything outside of what its configured to, why does the name of the publish profile override the configuration build you have set? With some further investigation, it seems that it might be transforming the chosen configured build first (Staging), then it transforms any config with the same name as your publish profile (Release).

This interaction seems extremely dangerous to me, so would anybody be able to explain to me why Visual Studio would do this (or if I have maybe encountered a bug)?