U.S. Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse is undoubtedly a Democrat, but lately it seems he’s spending some significant time trying to work on legislation with his Republican colleagues.

U.S. Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., an architect of the McCain-Feingold law, has been talking with Whitehouse among others for a couple of months about Whitehouse’s proposed DISCLOSE Act that would require more information from political donors, The Hill reports:

“I’ve been having discussions with Sen. [Sheldon] Whitehouse [D-R.I.] and a couple others on the issue,” McCain told The Hill. …

Whitehouse said he is excited about the prospect of having McCain as an ally.

“He has a really remarkable record of courage and dedication in this area, so it’s a question of working to make sure the technical issues he wants to address and the technical issues that we want to address make a match and we can find something to agree on,” Whitehouse said. “We are beginning those discussions, but they’ve come to no conclusion yet, other than they are going forward amicably.” …

McCain’s support would boost [the legislation's] prospects immediately.

Meanwhile, Politico reports on the junior senator’s efforts to push stalled cybersecurity legislation:

With no sign of a solution to a partisan Senate impasse on two competing cybersecurity bills from Joe Lieberman and John McCain, it seems the best chance for Senate passage of a cyber bill this year lies with other senators who are now trying to steer the debate. Sens. Lindsey Graham and Sheldon Whitehouse are working together to find a compromise between the two bills. And Whitehouse, along with Sens. Jon Kyl, Barbara Mikulski and Roy Blunt, plans to hold a classified briefing for senators to discuss the similarities and differences ….

Meanwhile, Whitehouse is looking like a lock for reelection in November – this week 538′s Nate Silver put the odds of him winning a second term at 99%. (That’s not a typo.) But Republican Barry Hinckley is still gamely trying to make a race out of it, sending press releases like this one today: “Senate Democrats Refuse To Offer a Budget Resolution For Third Straight Year.”

As predicted here on Nesi’s Notes, Congressman Jim Langevin has come out against the Stop Online Piracy Act. “While I strongly support protecting our intellectual property, SOPA’s methods are incompatible with efforts to maintain the security and openness of the internet,” he said in a statement.

Langevin is the first of Rhode Island’s four members of Congress to take a position on the legislation, as far as I know. More on Politico Morning Tech.

Update: Anchor Rising’s Patrick Laverty reports U.S. Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse is sponsoring the Senate version of SOPA.

In the wake of two high-profile reports of cyber attacks this month – first against the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, then the elite consultancy Stratfor Global Intelligence – Congressman Jim Langevin is renewing his call for Washington to take stronger steps to protect the nation’s digital infrastructure.

The Stratfor attack is particularly concerning, Langevin said. ”When you have a major firm specializing in cybersecurity getting hacked this way, it gives you an idea of how difficult this problem is and how much ground still needs to be covered to better secure our cyber networks,” he said Wednesday in a statement.

“Consider also that many of our most critical industries still aren’t taking cyber threats seriously, even though they do not have the level of expertise that Stratfor does and an attack on them could result in much more serious damage than this incident,” Langevin said. In the past, he’s pointed to electric and water utilities as potential targets.

Rhode Island’s 2nd District congressman has become one of Congress’s leading authorities on digital threats and is cofounder of the Congressional Cybersecurity Caucus. In June he authored an op-ed for The Hill’s website entitled “Preventing a cyber Sept. 11.” (For more on the topic, try David Scharfenberg’s May Providence Phoenix story.)

However, Langevin has yet to weigh in on the top hot-button digital debate roiling Congress these days: the controversial Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) that’s before the House Judiciary Committee. But considering the concerns experts have raised about its potential to compromise cybersecurity, it won’t be surprising if he decides to oppose it.

There’s probably no issue more closely associated with Congressman Jim Langevin than cybersecurity. He’s even talked about it on “60 Minutes.” So Langevin is a bet miffed that House Speaker John Boehner’s new task force examining the issue is GOP-only, Politico reports:

Shortly after Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) and Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.) unveiled the 12-member Republican task force late last week, a prominent lawmaker protested that Democrats were being excluded from the group.

“It’s frustrating to see at the leadership level that Speaker Boehner and Cantor are making this into a partisan issue,” Rep. Jim Langevin (D-R.I.) told POLITICO. “There’s too much at stake here, and we need to have both parties working on this.”

When Langevin caught wind that only Republicans would be appointed to the task force, he sent a letter to Boehner on June 15 asking him to reconsider and open membership to both parties. …

In a statement to POLITICO, Boehner’s spokesman Michael Steel stressed that members of both parties can weigh in on cybersecurity issues regardless of whether they’re on the task force or not.

For a good overview of D.C.’s cybersecurity efforts up to now, and Langevin’s role in it, check out this Providence Phoenix story from last month.