Sen. Thad Cochran (R-Miss.) married a longtime aide on Saturday, one year after his office swatted down rumors of a romance amid criticism of their shared taxpayer-funded travel. 
 
 Cochran, 77, married Kay Webber, 76, an executive assistant who first joined his office in 1981, in a private family ceremony in Gulfport, Miss., his office said in a one-sentence statement Monday. 
 
 Their relationship sparked a key dispute during his reelection campaign last year, as supporters of his challenger, state Sen. Chris McDaniel, pointed out that Webber had traveled with Cochran on dozens of Senate trips overseas. 
 
 Over the past 12 years, records showed that Webber had joined Cochran on more than 30 publicly funded international trips costing more than $150,000, the Clarion-Ledger reported in 2014. 
 
 Critics also pointed to records that showed the six-term senator rented the basement apartment of Webber’s $1.6 million Washington rowhouse as proof of an untoward relationship. 
 
 Cochran’s Senate and campaign staff defended Webber’s involvement in the travel and apartment as “strictly professional” and “perfectly appropriate” for a senior staff member. 
 
 Webber, who makes about $140,000 a year, was said to attend official meetings and social functions, help the senator maintain his travel schedule and organize constituent events, his office said. 
 
 Cochran spokesman Jordan Russell told the Clarion-Ledger a year ago that Webber “is a member of the staff and a trusted aide, and any other suggestion is silly gossip.” 
 
 Rumors of the couple’s marriage had begun to swirl earlier this month, the Mississippi newspaper reported Monday, though Cochran staffers denied knowing of any wedding as recently as last week. 
 
 Cochran’s wife, Rose, died in December at age 73, after 50 years of marriage and 13 years in a Mississippi nursing home. She had dementia. 
 
 A political blogger who sneaked into the facility last year used photos of the bedridden woman taken without her permission to allege that the senator and Webber were having an affair. Cochran’s aides again said there was nothing inappropriate about the relationship. 
 
 The blogger, Clayton Kelly, and three others were arrested on felony charges in connection with the photos. The case is ongoing. ||||| Congratulations are in order for Senator Thad Cochran, Republican of Mississippi, who married Kay Webber, a longtime aide, in Gulfport, Miss., on Saturday. The wedding comes about a year after the 77-year-old Republican won his party’s nomination in one of the most personal and intense primary battles in the country. 
 
 A blogger and supporter of Mr. Cochran’s opponent took pictures of the senator’s bedridden wife, who died in December, and posted them in a video online. Rumors of an affair between Mr. Cochran and Ms. Webber, also 77, persisted throughout the campaign. 
 
 Mr. Cochran rented the basement apartment in a home owned by Ms. Webber in Washington. She also went with him on 28 trips to 45 countries, despite her having no particular area of expertise, all at taxpayer expense. 
 
 But officials from his office dismissed the rumors, with The Clarion-Ledger newspaper in Jackson, Miss., reporting that Mr. Cochran’s staff members were denying knowledge of the coming nuptials as recently as this month. On Monday, his office put out a one-sentence news release announcing that the couple had been married in a private family ceremony, just off the coast of Mississippi.
– Thad Cochran's camp batted down rumors last year of a romance between the senator and longtime aide Kay Webber, the New York Times reports, amid criticism that Webber had joined Cochran on 28 taxpayer-funded trips to 45 countries costing more than $150,000. Now, in a one-sentence statement, his office confirms that Cochran, 77, put a ring on it on Saturday during a private family ceremony in Gulfport, Miss., the Clarion-Ledger reports. Cochran's wife of 50 years—photographed by an anti-Cochran blogger in a nursing home last year—died in December at 73 after suffering from dementia, the Washington Post reports. A Cochran rep says Webber, 77, who joined Cochran's staff in 1981, will stay on as an executive assistant. Supporters of Chris McDaniel, Cochran's challenger in the Republican US Senate primary, argued last year that Cochran was carrying on an affair with Webber, a claim they backed up with records showing the senator rented Webber's basement apartment in Washington while his wife spent 13 years in a nursing home. At the time, Cochran's office maintained Webber was "a member of the staff and a trusted aide," who attended meetings and social functions with the senator while organizing his schedule. "Any other suggestion is silly gossip," his office said.