As a campaigner, Mr. Trump largely ignores the epidemic of gun carnage that claims more than 30,000 lives in the United States each year, except to repeat N.R.A. bromides about the need for citizens to arm themselves. He would rather exaggerate the threat from foreign terrorists on our shores than talk about the far more lethal threat posed by disturbed Americans’ easy access to battlefield-style weapons — weapons profiting a gun industry that the group serves as a virtual marketing partner.

In contrast, Mrs. Clinton has chosen to defy past warnings that gun control and the N.R.A. are a politically lethal topic and has made the issue a centerpiece of her campaign. She offers a wide list of lifesaving proposals, including restoration of the assault weapons ban that Mr. Trump supported until he switched his position last March in a Republican presidential debate.

Mrs. Clinton has been asking voters to stand up to the gun lobby, a regressive political force that Republican politicians fearfully obey. Mr. Trump mouths vigilante nonsense about the necessity of being legally armed for the next gun spree. “If I’m in that room and let’s say we have two or five or 40 people with guns,” he says. “We’re going to do a lot better because there’s going to be a shootout.”

A shootout? Give us a break, as Mr. Trump likes to say. Far better that he muster the courage to engage in a detailed debate with Mrs. Clinton on precisely what to do about reining in guns, a national scourge. The coming TV debates must not allow him to dodge the subject with N.R.A. bluster.

Research shows the folly of the group’s “concealed carry” campaign to arm millions of ordinary citizens in all manner of public venues, from college campuses to restaurants, churches and schools. Far from stopping mass shooters in their tracks, these gun owners have been shooting themselves, family members and others. Since 2007, concealed-carry handgun holders have been responsible for at least 873 deaths not involving self-defense, including 29 mass shootings and close to 300 suicides, according to the Violence Policy Center, a gun safety group. So much for Mr. Trump’s shootout option.