Cardozo Law Professor Kate Shaw in the Atlantic on the Electoral College. From the article:

John Eastman. Rudy Giuliani. Donald Trump himself.

These people all bear some responsibility for the events of January 6, 2021. But there is another contributing factor—an institution, not a person—whose role is regularly overlooked, and that deserves a focus in the ongoing January 6 committee hearings: the Electoral College. The Electoral College isn’t responsible for President Trump’s efforts to remain in office despite his clear loss. But it was integral to Trump’s strategy, and it has everything to do with how close he came to success.

Further:

Put plainly, for a candidate determined to win at all costs, the Electoral College was central to a postelection strategy designed to convert loss into victory. Last night’s opening hearings of the January 6 committee made clear that Trump and his advisers were well aware no good-faith legal basis existed to dispute the election’s results. In a nationwide popular vote, a deficit of 7 million votes would have been impossible to challenge using ostensibly lawful means; the fact of the Electoral College meant that flipping a few close states, or coercing the vice president into throwing out those states’ votes,  would have been enough to change the election’s outcome.