WASHINGTON If Donald Trump seems more desperate than most incumbents about the coming election, he may have good reason: Presidents do not typically have to worry about going to prison if they lose.

But Trumps activities in recent years from paying hush money to a porn star to his claiming of a massive tax refund to obstructing an investigation into his campaigns ties to Russia combined with a ticking statute of limitations clock potentially make Election Day far more consequential for him than it had been for his predecessors.

If Trump wins a second term, the time limit for starting a prosecution would run out in the next four years for a number of those activities, given Justice Department guidelines not to prosecute a sitting president. If Trump loses, indictments could quickly follow.

Winning this election for him is not an option. Its a necessity, said Michael Cohen, Trumps former personal lawyer and fixer who was sentenced for, among other charges, arranging illegal payments to keep women hed had affairs with from speaking out before the 2016 election.

He knows that if his tax returns are revealed that he and his children Don Jr. , Ivanka, Eric and others will be charged with a host of criminal tax issues, which will not only cost him his freedom but his entire business, Cohen said.

Neither the White House nor the Trump campaign responded to HuffPost queries for this report.

Trump was already described as Individual-1 in Cohens prosecution. With a five-year statute of limitations for many federal crimes, the clock would run out on the hush money cases in late 2021.

Daniel Goldman, a former federal prosecutor who a year ago served as the lead lawyer in the Houses impeachment of Trump, said an ex-President Trump in 2021 could also face charges of bribery for his commutation of aide Roger Stones prison sentence as well as extortion charges for his attempts to coerce Ukraine into smearing his political rival, former Vice President Joe Biden . Trump was impeached for that but was permitted by Republicans in the Senate to remain in office.

Theres so much criminality here, said Nick Ackerman, a former federal prosecutor and, prior to that, a prosecutor in the task force created to investigate President Richard Nixon for the 1972 Watergate break-in and subsequent cover-up.

Any federal tax or bank fraud Trump may have committed in the first three years of his first term would likely be beyond the reach of prosecutors if they have to wait until the end of a second term in January 2025. A similar fate could befall Trumps work to throttle special counsel Robert Muellers 2017-2019 investigation into Russias work to help Trump win the last presidential campaign.