MEXICO CITY (By Will Weissert, Associated Press) January 19, 2006 — Mexico's presidential campaign is focusing on the millions who leave for better-paying jobs in the United States, with candidates promising to create better opportunities at home while railing against American immigration policies.

Illegal migration should again seize the spotlight Thursday, when the three major presidential hopefuls begin official campaigning after a Christmas break mandated by the country's electoral body.

Although they disagree on almost everything else, the top candidates for the July 2 election have all pledged to bolster the economy and attract international investment to make Mexican jobs attractive enough to keep people from heading north.

President Vicente Fox made the same promises before his 2000 election, but migration continued unabated.

Fox had said he would expand the economy by 7 percent a year. When economic doldrums struck worldwide after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks, however, the president was forced to downgrade his domestic growth forecasts.

The current administration also struggled for a migration accord with Washington that would grant legal status to many of the estimated 6 million undocumented Mexicans in the United States.

But no agreement is likely before Fox leaves office on Dec. 1. He is limited by the constitution to a single six-year term.

Mexican politicians have been promising for decades to reduce migration to the United States, but simply creating new jobs isn't enough, political analyst Jose Antonio Crespo said.

"Many illegal (migrants) are now more educated and have opportunities in Mexico but prefer jobs in the United States," he said. "Even with illegal jobs, the pay is higher."

The migration issue will be most visible Thursday when presidential candidate Roberto Madrazo holds a rally in Izucar de Matamoros, referred to by some as a ghost town because much of its population has left for the United States.

Madrazo, whose Institutional Revolutionary Party controlled Mexico's presidency from its founding in 1929 until losing to Fox, says he is serious about keeping would-be migrants from leaving Mexico in a way the current administration — and seven decades of governments controlled by his party — were not.

For months, the race's front-runner has been Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador, who resigned as Mexico City's mayor to run for president with the leftist Democratic Revolution Party.

His lead has diminished in recent months, however.

A poll published Wednesday by the Mexico City daily Milenio had the former mayor ahead with 37 percent compared to 31 percent for Felipe Calderon of Fox's National Action Party. Madrazo was one point behind Calderon. The newspaper interviewed 1,000 adults from across Mexico between Jan. 12 and 16. The margin of error was 3.2 percentage points.

Lopez Obrador is opening his campaign in Metlatonoc, a southern town with the lowest standard of living in Mexico as measured by a 2004 U.N. report on Human Development.

Lopez Obrador says it pains him to see Mexicans risk their lives sneaking across the U.S. border. He says economic reform is not about ideology but necessity.

Mexicans have condemned a bill passed by the U.S. House of Representatives that would build 700 miles of additional border fences in California, Arizona, New Mexico and Texas. The proposal also would make illegal entry a felony and enlist military and local police to help stop undocumented migrants.

"It has intensified the issue, and anti-American sentiment is growing," Crespo said. "A wall is very symbolic and sends a message."

Calderon has said that "instead of labor going to where the capital is, we will make it so investment comes here to where our people are."

That is good news to Samuel Chavez, a Mexico City engineer who has two uncles and four cousins living illegally in California.

"Fox said the right things but we need a candidate who can bring home a migration agreement," he said. "Mexico needs results, not good intentions."

Crespo and other analysts say Mexican limits on foreign investment in the oil industry and other key sectors have hindered a cash infusion from abroad that might spur true economic reform.