Americans in NZ rally against Trump

American expats horrified by the thought of Donald Trump as president say they are making a special effort to cast absentee ballots from New Zealand.

An estimated eight million US citizens live overseas - about 21,500 of them in New Zealand.

RNZ was unable to find any New Zealand-based voters who said they were casting their ballot for controversial Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump - but plenty said they had been spurred to vote against him.

Some had not voted in an American election for years.

"I didn't vote the last two [presidential] elections," Wellington bar owner Rose Andaloro, 32, said.

"I don't like to admit that, but it actually was very challenging."

But her fear of Mr Trump being elected was enough to motivate her this year.

"She apparently still has her position, which is nuts," Ms Andaloro said.

Advocacy website Avaaz was among those encouraging expats to enrol and vote, launching an online tool to simplify the process.

Auckland music manager Ayisha Jaffer said she was reminded to enrol after seeing ads for such tools on social media.

"They said, like, 'Don't let Trump get in! Register absentee ballot now! Eight million against Trump!' So I clicked on one of these websites and they made it really straightforward and easy to enrol.'"

She had been encouraging other Americans she knew in New Zealand to enrol, even though recent polls had shown the gap between Mr Trump and his Democrat rival Hillary Clinton widening.

"I'm a little bit worried about the Brexit effect, where everybody goes, 'Oh, there's no way Trump's going to get in, everybody else will vote so he doesn't ... and then it becomes close, like 52 percent [for] Trump."

Auckland video editor Doug Dillaman also mentioned the 'Brexit effect' as a motivating factor.

Mr Dillaman, 43, did not cast an absentee ballot in 2012 because he did not think his vote would change the outcome for his home state, Michigan.

This year was different, he said.

"Brexit gave me a lot less confidence in polls to begin with, and also the unusual nature of Trump relative to standard left-right divides meant that typical conventional wisdom of how a state might go based on their past voting didn't seem to necessarily apply this year - and also just how egregiously terrible of a human being Donald Trump was."

Even though Mrs Clinton now looked likely to win, he was still pleased he had added his vote to her tally.

"I hope that he loses in a landslide so none of this nonsense about rigged votes can even be an issue. It was very much more an anti-Trump than a pro-Clinton [vote]. I have my issues about Clinton ... but it's just not even close in terms of the relative risks."

Nelson actor Laura Irish, who has lived in New Zealand for eight years, was another voting for Mrs Clinton.

"Donald Trump is crazy. We can't have that man. It's so hard to articulate just how horrifying this is."

Her state, Illinois, tended to be a Democratic state, but Champagne County - where she was registered - was "a very conservative, evangelical Christian area".

Her step-sister had just got in touch to tell her their parents were among those who would be voting for Mr Trump.

"She was just absolutely distraught. I was like, what can we do about this? And she was like, at least we know our vote cancels theirs out."

She was struggling to understand her parents' motivation, even though her father was a staunch Republican.

"I think they kind of like the idea that he's shaking things up and they also really hate Hillary [Clinton] - she's just put so many people off."

Not all New Zealand-based Americans were fired up.

Former Auckland mayoral candidate John Palino said, unlike in previous elections, he would not be voting.

"I don't like either of them [the candidates].

"When you look at both, for me, you just think - no."