ALBANY — Governor Spitzer’s efforts to resist a Senate inquiry into the scandal over his administration’s use of state police to tarnish a political foe may receive a boost from the New York State Ethics Commission, which is likely to launch its own investigation into the matter.

The commission yesterday requested transcripts, notes, and emails collected by Attorney General Andrew Cuomo’s office during its investigation into the governor’s office, which was found to have ordered police to take special measures to track the use of security escorts by the Republican Senate majority leader, Joseph Bruno, in an effort to discredit him in the press. The commission will decide whether to launch its own investigation after reviewing the materials, a spokesman said.

A probe by the ethics commission, which monitors and investigates violations of state ethics laws and can refer violations for criminal prosecution, may not seem useful for Mr. Spitzer, who is trying to contain a controversy that has already led to the suspension of his communications director, Darren Dopp, and the demotion of his police liaison, and threatens to overwhelm his agenda.

An investigation, however, may help the governor make a case for not cooperating with a Senate inquiry by providing him cover from accusations by Republicans that his administration is trying to prevent the release of more damaging information.

Unlike the attorney general’s office, the commission is armed with subpoena power and can require testimony under oath, but is also led by a Spitzer appointee, John Feerick. A Senate inquiry would be led by Republicans, who seem intent on exposing more impropriety in the governor’s office.

Senate Republicans will soon decide whether to proceed with their own inquiry, which would be ostensibly related to new legislation, and have also requested to review investigative documents from the attorney general’s office and the inspector general’s office, which conducted a joint probe of the governor’s office and drew the same conclusions.

Assembly and Senate Democrats publicly say they are opposed to Senate hearings on the scandal but privately say the governor’s deflection of questions has encouraged further scrutiny.

At a press conference, Mr. Spitzer appeared rattled as he faced an onslaught of questions from reporters about why two of his top aides, Mr. Dopp and his chief of staff, Richard Baum, refused to offer sworn testimony to Mr. Cuomo’s investigators.

“The request was that they provide information,” Mr. Spitzer said. “I was not the one in the backand-forth with the attorney general’s office. I was not involved in that process. “

A source close to Mr. Spitzer said the governor did not anticipate the grilling he received yesterday and is unlikely to take more press questions about the investigation until Monday.

The absence of sworn testimony from Messrs. Baum and Dopp has fueled suspicions among Senate Republicans that administration officials have not been forthcoming about the plot against Mr. Bruno.

In an interview, Mr. Baum said he provided a sworn statement instead of testimony because the governor’s office did not want him to engage in a “free-ranging” interview that would touch on areas concerning private advice to the governor.

He said he was aware that Messrs. Dopp and the police liaison, William Howard, were pulling together information about Mr. Bruno’s travel records but thought they were responding to information requests from the press.

He also insists that he was not aware that state police had taken any special measures to retrieve the records of Mr. Bruno and assumed that it was standard practice of the police to preserve the travel schedules.

The attorney general’s report quotes from an e-mail message to Mr. Baum from Mr. Dopp in which the latter discusses the state police’s possession of travel records of an unnamed individual who is presumably Mr. Bruno. The e-mail says: “Also, I think there is a new and different way to proceed re media.” Mr. Baum said he recalls that the line in Mr. Dopp’s e-mail was not referring to Mr. Bruno but concerned a strategy for encouraging the press to report more substantially on the series of public meetings that Mr. Spitzer held with legislative leaders to discuss pending legislation.

“Obviously people are going to ask questions,” Mr. Baum said. “The press should be skeptical, but all I could do is say what happened.