mvn-gpg-plugin says gpg version is null but gpg commands work in command line

Question

I want to publish my local library to the Maven Repository. One step in their documentation is to add

 <plugin>
      <groupId>org.apache.maven.plugins</groupId>
      <artifactId>maven-gpg-plugin</artifactId>
      <version>3.0.1</version>
      <executions>
        <execution>
          <id>sign-artifacts</id>
          <phase>verify</phase>
          <goals>
            <goal>sign</goal>
          </goals>
        </execution>
      </executions>
    </plugin>

to the pom file. This obviosly requires having gpg set up. I already have Kleopatra set up and can run gpg commands in my command line.

gpg --version
gpg (GnuPG) 2.4.3

gpg is also added to the system Path.

But when running mvn clean deploy, I get

[ERROR] Failed to execute goal org.apache.maven.plugins:maven-gpg-plugin:3.0.1:sign (sign-artifacts) on project ownDependency: Execution sign-artifacts of goal org.apache.maven.plugins :maven-gpg-plugin:3.0.1:sign failed: Cannot invoke "org.apache.maven.plugins.gpg.GpgVersion.toString()" because "gpgVersion" is null

I added antrun to see if Maven can execute gpg commands

   <plugin>
                <groupId>org.apache.maven.plugins</groupId>
                <artifactId>maven-antrun-plugin</artifactId>
                <version>3.0.0</version>
                <executions>
                    <execution>
                        <id>run-gpg-command</id>
                        <phase>validate</phase>
                        <goals>
                            <goal>run</goal>
                        </goals>
                        <configuration>
                            <target>
                                <exec executable="gpg" failonerror="true">
                                    <arg value="--version"/>
                                </exec>
                            </target>
                        </configuration>
                    </execution>
                </executions>
            </plugin>

an it succesfully prints

[INFO] --- antrun:3.0.0:run (run-gpg-command) @ project---
[INFO] Executing tasks
[INFO]      [exec] gpg (GnuPG) 2.4.3

Just in case that this could be related to the settings.xml file, as explained in the documentation, I added

<profile>
      <id>ossrh</id>
      <activation>
        <activeByDefault>true</activeByDefault>
      </activation>
      <properties>
        <gpg.executable>gpg2</gpg.executable>
        <gpg.passphrase>passphrase</gpg.passphrase>
      </properties>
    </profile>

and

  <server>
      <id>ossrh</id>
      <username>fgutzy</username>
      <password>s&amp;N8CI0TiCfeG7SV</password>
    </server>