This isn’t a bad thing, and it shows how both distros serve a different purpose. Kicksecure values privacy and freedom while still focusing on security hardening. This is what we need more of instead of solely focusing on security and ignoring freedom.
I’d also add that Secureblue adopts to modern technologies like Wayland and Atomic-based distros while Kicksecure remains traditional with a Debian base, so it all comes down to personal preference.
Discussion related
Kicksecure could be made an honorable mention until it fully switches to Wayland, and perhaps Alpine Linux and/or possibly Gentoo could be added as honorable mentions too since they cater to specific niches (Alpine not using Systemd or the GNU userland and Gentoo being source-based), meet the criteria, but definitely can’t be recommended for most people who aren’t knowledgeable about computers and Linux.
However PG already recommends more than enough Linux distros for use cases, and the software minimalism and anti-systemd niches are a small portion of the community. Most people don’t even know what an init system is let alone care about it.