Left-leaning Californians say they would rather leave America than stay with George W. Bush as president.

“Do you think Great Britain would give us political asylum?” a woman in Starbucks asked. “It’s just…I don’t think I can stay if Bush wins again.”

In the heavily Democratic state of California, it has become an increasingly familiar refrain: supporters of Senator Kerry, fearful he will not triumph in tomorrow’s presidential election, claim they will move abroad if President Bush is re-elected.

At first, the threat was little more than a joke. Now, on the eve of one of the most polarized elections in recent history, some say they really do intend to leave should “the worst” occur. There seems little doubt Californians will deliver the state’s valuable 55 electoral votes to the Democratic candidate. In a poll on Friday, Mr. Kerry had a seven point lead statewide, with a 24-point lead in Los Angeles County and a 35-point lead in the San Francisco Bay area.

But fear about what may happen in the key swing states of Ohio, Florida, and Pennsylvania has led to an escalation in coffee shop chatter about emigration to Canada, Britain, and elsewhere.

“I certainly don’t love the climate of Vancouver, but I love the sanity,” said Steve Crawford, 54, a singer and actor working as a volunteer at the Democratic Party offices in Santa Monica, near Los Angeles.

He and his wife, Karen, have been investigating selling their home in Pacific Palisades, an upmarket area close to the coast, and moving to Canada.

“For someone like me, if this happens, I can’t in good conscience allow myself to support another Bush government, even benignly. And a lot of other people are saying the same. I have a good friend who is adamant he will leave if Bush is re-elected.”

Mr. Crawford said it would be a difficult decision to move his 9-year-old son from his elementary school. “But if I feel he’s going to be living in an environment that’s not safe for him, then I will do it. First and foremost, I’m a dad.”

Gretchen Witte, 35, from Alhambra, east of Los Angeles, who runs her own Internet business, is making plans to move to London, where she previously lived for eight years, should Mr. Bush win.

“As a woman, the current climate is becoming intolerable. Bush has just appointed a man to the FDA reproductive health panel who believes that women with medical trouble should pray to Jesus for relief. If this is what America is becoming, I cannot live here. The only reason I can sleep at night is the thought that I can leave the country if he wins.”

Voluntary exile as a political statement is nothing new. Democratic-supporting celebrities have a habit of making (usually empty) threats to leave should the election not go their way. Robert Redford, a vocal critic of Mr. Bush’s policies, was reported earlier this month to have vowed to move to Ireland, where he owns homes near Dublin, if Mr. Bush is re-elected.

Before the 2000 poll, Alec Baldwin’s then wife, Kim Basinger, told Germany’s Focus magazine that the actor “might leave the country if Bush is elected…and then I’d probably have to go too.” Mr. Baldwin did not leave.

The only public figure to carry out his promise was Pierre Salinger, the White House press secretary during the Kennedy administration, who died last month. Before the 2000 election, he said: “If Bush wins, I’m going to leave the country and spend the rest of my life in France.” He did.