Donald Trump is expected to appear in Manhattan state court on Thursday morning for a hearing in his hush-money criminal case involving the adult film star Stormy Daniels and the playboy model Karen McDougal.

The judge, Juan Merchan, is expected to announce his decision on several issues, including the former US president’s motion to throw out the case.

Merchan is also expected to announce whether Trump’s trial will start on 25 March. Should Trump’s trial begin on this date, it would be the first of four criminal cases against him to go before a jury.

Despite his legal issues – which span multiple fronts aside from this New York case – Trump is the overwhelming favorite to secure the Republican presidential nomination and face Joe Biden in the 2024 race for the White House. In most polls Trump ties or has the edge on Biden, including in key swing states.

Trump was charged in April with 34 counts related to the alleged falsification of business records as part of a purported scheme to cover up extramarital affairs. This conspiracy, in turn, was meant to influence the 2016 election, prosecutors said.

Trump’s indictment marked the first time in US history that a former president was charged with a crime. He has pleaded not guilty.

The Manhattan district attorney’s office has accused Trump of trying to sway the presidential race “by identifying and purchasing negative information about him to suppress its publication and benefit the defendant’s electoral prospects”.

Prosecutors contend that Trump shuttled hundreds of thousands to his then attorney, Michael Cohen, in an effort to bury accounts of marital infidelity, and then listed the expenses as legal costs in business documents.

The indictment focuses on payouts to Daniels and McDougal, and also involves a doorman at Trump Tower who said he had information about Trump fathering a child out of wedlock. Trump has denied these liaisons.

Prosecutors said Cohen paid $130,000 to Daniels and coordinated with the publisher of the National Enquirer to give McDougal $150,000, to suppress their accounts. In turn, Trump’s namesake company allegedly repaid Cohen $420,000 in several installments.

The charge Trump faces, falsifying business records, is a class E felony, carrying a maximum prison sentence of four years. The hush-money case is a state prosecution, not federal, so Trump would not be able to pardon himself if he won the presidency in 2024.

In August, Georgia state prosecutors charged Trump and 18 others with scheming to unlawfully overturn Joe Biden’s narrow win. Also in August, the justice department special counsel Jack Smith indicted Trump for allegedly trying to overturn the 2020 election.

In June, Smith charged Trump with illegally keeping classified documents that he allegedly took to Mar-a-Lago after leaving office. The next month, Trump was charged in an alleged plot to have an employee scrub surveillance footage at Mar-a-Lago.

Whether or not Merchan sets a trial date, Trump’s legal woes in New York could intensify even more this week. The New York Times reported that the judge overseeing Trump’s civil business fraud case might issue a decision on financial penalties this Friday.

The state attorney general’s office is asking Judge Arthur Engoron to impose a $370m penalty on Trump. Prosecutors also asked Engoron to permanently prohibit Trump from participating in the state’s real estate industry or serving as the officer or director of New York corporations.

Trump suffered a significant financial hit on 26 January when a Manhattan federal court civil jury awarded the writer E Jean Carroll an $83.3m verdict in her second defamation trial against him. Carroll previously won $5m in a sexual abuse and defamation case against Trump with a jury determining that he assaulted her around early 1996 – and tarnished her reputation with his denials.