Clear your calendars for March 4 next year.

The federal judge overseeing former President Donald J. Trump’s prosecution on charges of conspiring to overturn the 2020 election set a trial date on Monday for early March, laying out a schedule that was close to the government’s initial request of January and that rebuffed Mr. Trump’s extraordinary proposal to push off the proceeding until nearly a year and a half after the 2024 election.

The decision by Judge Tanya S. Chutkan, issued at a contentious hearing in Federal District Court in Washington, to start the trial on March 4 potentially brought it into conflict with two other trials that Mr. Trump is facing that month.

The district attorney in Fulton County, Ga., has proposed taking Mr. Trump to trial on charges of tampering with the election in that state on the same day. A second trial in Manhattan, in which Mr. Trump has been accused of more than 30 felonies connected to hush-money payments to a porn actress in the run-up the 2016 election, is set to go to trial on March 25.

This is what happens when you commit a lot of crimes.

Mr. Trump has made no secret in conversations with his aides that he would like to solve his uniquely complicated legal woes by winning the election. If either of his two federal trials is delayed until after the race and Mr. Trump prevails, he could seek to pardon himself after taking office or have his attorney general dismiss the matters altogether.

That “could seek” is very polite. Of course he’s going to pardon himself if he gets the chance.