Last week, ThinkProgress reported that Arizona’s two Republican senators, John McCain and Jon Kyl, are obstructing judicial nominees for their own state, which happens to be one of the most overloaded court system in America. Ian Millhiser wrote how McCain is holding up Rosemary Marquez, a defense attorney nominated by President Obama for the District Court of Arizona. Now, McCain is offering a demonstrably false explanation of why Marquez’ nomination is not moving forward:

When asked about attorney Rosemary Marquez’s appointment, he said her name hadn’t been submitted yet to the U.S. Judiciary Committee.

“We have not seen it submitted by the administration so neither Jon Kyl and I are blocking it. If her name is submitted we will go through the process which is our constitutional responsibility,” said Senator John McCain.

In reality, Marquez’s nomination was submitted to the Judiciary Committee three months ago on June 23, 2011. As the local Fox affiliate notes, Judiciary Committee staff confirmed the nomination with reporters in Arizona, and even provided Marquez’s nominee number (PN724112).

The massacre this year, in which Chief Judge John Roll was murdered in the same shooting that targeted Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-AZ), left the district court with three vacancies. The Judicial Conference of the United States believes that eight additional judges are required to keep up with the court’s exploding caseload, where felony case filings alone nearly doubled from 3,023 in 2008 to 5,219 in 2010.

Why is McCain offering false explanations for why Marquez’ nomination is not moving forward? Its not clear. However, McCain has a long history of exploiting the broken rules of the Senate to in ways that benefit his corporate benefactors. In 2009, he worked with corporate lobbyists at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce to block a key nominee to the Labor Relations Board. Chamber board members donated nearly $400,000 to his presidential campaign in 2008, and he received renewed Chamber support shortly after he placed a hold on this nomination.

Last year, when Texas Gov. Rick Perry (R) ran for re-election, the private prisons industry gave Perry tens of thousands of dollars in campaign donations. Perhaps that explains why he suddenly developed a passionate desire to privatize Texas’ state prison health system after his campaign was over:

[Corrections Corporation of America lobbyist Michael] Toomey, who had not contributed directly to any of the Governor’s previous gubernatorial campaigns, opened up his wallet for two separate $10,000 donations to Perry two months before Election Day in 2010. Thomas Beasley, the founder of CCA, has given $17,000 to Perry’s campaigns over the last decade. Another private prison firm, the GEO Group, poured $15,000 into Perry’s 2010 reelection effort in 2010 through its eponymous political action committee. Luis Gonzalez, a GEO Group lobbyist, meanwhile, gave $50,000 to Perry’s reelection bid.

Perry first floated the health care privatization proposal in his 2011 budget, which noted: “The Governor’s budget recommends canceling necessary contracts early to explore private sector delivery options, or instructing the state-supported institution to provide correctional care according to the constitutional minimum level.” Mike Ward of the Austin American-Statesman reported that Perry adviser Mike Morrissey held a closed-door meeting in March to discuss the privatization proposal with potential vendors—but not, pointedly, the state university-operated facilities that currently run things.

Perry’s privatization plan eventually died in Texas’ overwhelmingly Republican state legislature because, in the words of Republican State Rep. Jerry Madden “[t]here was no evidence that it could be done cheaper.”

Despite this fact, Perry is just one of several right-wing state governors with cozy ties to the prisons-for-profit industry. Two of Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer’s (R) most senior aides are current or former lobbyists for private prisons, and this industry stands to earn a windfall off the anti-immigrant SB 1070 law that Brewer recently signed. Florida Gov. Rick Scott (R) turned over $600 million in corrections funding to the private prison industry after one private prisons company doled out hundreds of thousands of dollars to Scott and the Florida GOP. And Ohio Gov. John Kasich (R) plans to sell five of its prisons to a private company. Meanwhile, the private prisons industry has spent millions to lobby state lawmakers to make criminal laws harsher in order to drive up their profits.

Yet while private prisons are having no trouble getting the attention of GOP lawmakers, they aren’t actually very good at running correctional facilities. A study of Arizona’s prison system found that private prisons cost more than their government-run counterparts, despite the fact that they typically steer clear of the costliest inmates.

The Pima County GOP — which is in the same district where Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-AZ) was shot early this year — is holding a very insensitive fundraiser this week. The party is holding a raffle fundraiser, and the prize is a Glock handgun, the same category of weapon that was used to shoot Giffords:

As the Huffington Post’s Alex Brant-Zawadzki notes, “With 125 tickets, at $10 a ticket, the [Pima County Republican Party] could pull in a cool $1,250″ with the off-color fundraiser.