It is not often that the government seeks to show a jury a video of lap dances.

But that has happened in a bizarre case in which a former official and a civilian employee of the federal Drug Enforcement Administration are soon to be tried on charges that during national security background checks, they lied about their ownership in a strip club in South Hackensack, N.J.

The defense does not want the government to introduce the video evidence, which it characterizes as “third parties engaged in graphic sexual conduct” and which it says would unduly sway the jury.

“The prejudicial effect of the videos would be colossal if they are introduced as evidence at trial,” defense lawyers argued in court papers filed on Monday.

The trial, set for May 2, could also expose the gritty underbelly of strip club life if the judge, Paul G. Gardephe, allows prosecutors to admit the disputed evidence. Prosecutors want to show that the defendants and others openly discussed how the club’s dancers were largely illegal immigrants, mostly from Brazil or Russia, who had to pay other undocumented immigrants to drive them to the club, and then had to pay to be able to dance there.