Sen. Thad Cochran (R-MS) married his longtime aide Kay Webber Saturday in a private ceremony, his office announced Monday.
Cochran’s office said in a one-sentence statement that the two were married at a private family ceremony in Gulfport, Miss. Cochran spokesman Chris Gallegos told the Associated Press that Webber, who is the senator’s executive assistant, has worked with him since 1981.
Cochran’s former wife, Rose, died in hospice care in December after spending more than a decade in a Mississippi nursing home. She was 73 years old.
Rose Cochran became a focal point of the state’s contentious 2014 Republican U.S. Senate primary after a blogger who supported challenger Chris McDaniel was arrested for sneaking into the nursing home where she resided and taking a picture of her for use in an anti-Thad Cochran video. McDaniel supporters were trying to prove at the time that the senator showed “favoritism” toward Webber over his ailing wife, according to the New York Times.