Not really. It's just an effect of it. The explicitly stated purpose is to represent the states, not the people, as the original conception of the US was more like the EU than, say, Switzerland.
The Articles of Confederation were more like the EU, yes. The current US government as established by the US Constitution was definitely not, as it establishes a strong, central federal government with ultimate authority. The makeup of the senate, where each state no matter the size, has two senators was part of a bargain between the big and small states.
It’s funny you use Switzerland as your example, which has the Cantons. To an outside observer they are a first order approximation of US states. They even have citizenship!
Hah. That is fair. It admittedly was a poorly thought out comparison.