Senator Menendez could throw his wife under the bus in an upcoming federal bribery trial, according to court documents unsealed Tuesday. 

The senator’s lawyers could try to prove the “absence of any improper intent on Senator Menendez’s part” by showing how his wife, Nadine Menendez, withheld information from him “or otherwise led him to believe that nothing unlawful was taking place,” they wrote in a legal brief.

A judge ordered the lawyer’s brief be unsealed on Tuesday after a group of media organizations demanded Mr. Menendez’s lawyers disclose their defense strategy.

Mr. and Mrs. Menendez, along with two businessmen, Wael Hana and Fred Daibes, were charged with corruption in September for allegedly helping the Egyptian government in exchange for gold bars and wads of cash. Prosecutors additionally charged them with extortion in March for accepting bribes — including a new Mercedes-Benz C-300 convertible, which the senator gave to Mrs. Menendez when they began dating — so the senator would use his influence to benefit the Egyptian and Qatari governments. 

The couple will be tried separately, a federal judge ruled last week. Mr.  Menendez’s trial is set to begin May 6 in Manhattan and Mrs. Menendez’s trial is expected to begin later this summer. However, prosecutors are now seeking a delay over issues involving a defense attorney in the case. A federal judge, Sidney Stein, is hearing arguments about that delay on Wednesday morning.