| Today, Republicans who boosted President Donald Trump's effort to overturn the election are cheering something that happened in Pennsylvania: A court said that state's vote-by-mail law is unconstitutional. "Big news out of Pennsylvania," Trump said in a victorious-sounding statement. But this does nothing to vindicate him or those who tried to help him stay in power. Here's what's going on. Pennsylvania was a key state Republicans targeted after Trump's election loss: Joe Biden beat Trump in Pennsylvania by less than 1 percent, securing his win. Republicans — led by Sen. Josh Hawley of Missouri — tried to argue that Pennsylvania didn't follow its own election laws during the pandemic and that its votes shouldn't count.  Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) on Jan. 6, just before the attack. (Win McNamee/Getty Images) | Just to underscore what an absurd argument this was, some Trump allies tried to argue something similar in Pennsylvania court, and their case got angrily slammed shut by a Republican judge: "In the United States of America, this cannot justify the disenfranchisement of a single voter, let alone all the voters of its sixth most populated state. Our people, laws, and institutions demand more." But still, after the Jan. 6 riot, 147 congressional Republicans voted to overturn election results in Pennsylvania. What's happening now: Allegations of voter fraud in that state have been repeatedly debunked, but Republican-led lawsuits over the state's results haven't stopped. The one that's gained traction is a GOP lawsuit against Pennsylvania's no-excuse vote-by-mail system. The weird thing is that Republicans and Democrats in Pennsylvania originally approved a vote-by-mail law in 2019, before the pandemic. It was only after Trump started falsely claiming election fraud that the GOP decided to turn against the law. On Friday, a panel of state judges agreed with Republicans that the vote-by-mail law was unconstitutional, on a technicality that voters have to approve a constitutional amendment first, reports The Post's Mariana Alfaro. But saying that Pennsylvania legislators should have asked the voters first is nowhere near evidence that an election wasn't legitimate, as some in Trump World will inevitably try to claim. As Sen. Pat Toomey (R-Pa.) said in 2020: "Allegations of fraud by a losing campaign cannot justify overturning an election." Speaking of trying to steal an election Another aspect of Trump's efforts to strong-arm his way into power was to set up fake electors in states. Fake electors are exactly what they sounds like: Essentially, Republicans in five swing states that Trump lost got together, led by Trump attorney Rudy Giuliani, and decided they were the states' true electors — and surprise, that they thought Trump won their state. "You could say this is our howdy-doody to the system," one of them told The Post at the time. It was viewed as more of a political stunt than dangerous — the real electors were already confirming their states' legitimate election results and sending those to Congress to approve. (Here's more on how the electoral college works.) But now, some of those fake electors are being investigated by the federal government for what they did, reports The Post's Matt Zapotosky. The Jan. 6 committee in Congress has subpoenaed some of these fake electors, too. I asked Matt why this is significant and what could come of it. "It is one of the first indications we have that the Justice Department is examining — as a possible federal crime — a nonviolent way Trump supporters sought to overturn Biden's victory," he said. "The department has launched a massive investigation into the storming of the Capitol on Jan. 6. But that investigation has focused on those who either planned or carried out the violent attack, rather than what many commentators see as the related, Trump-led pressure campaign to overturn the election results. "But it's hard to say if anyone is in serious legal jeopardy. The electors did all this in public, more than a year ago. The department is only talking about this now because a couple of Democratic state attorneys general asked them to look into it. We haven't seen any sign that investigators are zeroing in on any particular targets, and we don't even know exactly what federal crimes are at issue — though it certainly seems like some type of fraud might be in play." A quick look at the Supreme Court nominating process President Biden said this week he will nominate a Black woman next month to replace Justice Stephen Breyer on the Supreme Court. From there, it's in Senate Democrats' hands. Here's a look at how that process will work. (And yes, to a reader question, they can start this while Breyer is still on the court, according to The Post's Seung Min Kim.)  (The Washington Post) | | 
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