NEW YORK — A source close to Utah's Gov. Jon Huntsman says President Obama plans to name the Republican governor as ambassador to China.

The source says Huntsman has accepted the appointment.

An announcement was expected at the White House this morning.

Huntsman, 49, has been mentioned as a potential 2012 presidential contender. He served as ambassador to Singapore under President George H.W. Bush. He speaks Mandarin Chinese and has an adopted daughter from China.

STIMULUS TO HELP LEAD-ABATEMENT WORK

LOS ANGELES — Nearly $100 million in federal stimulus money will go toward a program to remove lead-based paint and other health and safety hazards from low-income homes, Vice President Joe Biden announced yesterday in the courtyard of an affordable-housing development.

Biden said the program will immediately employ workers to do the lead-abatement work.

He said it also will save the country millions in future healthcare costs that otherwise would be spent treating people suffering from neurological damage, slowed growth and other ailments connected to growing up in contact with lead-based paint.

MCCAIN SPEAKS UP FOR U.S. GUN RIGHTS

PHOENIX — The drug war in Mexico shouldn't be used as an excuse to try to restrict American gun rights, Sen. John McCain said yesterday at the National Rifle Association's convention.

McCain said the United States needs to do more to crack down on gun smuggling into Mexico, but that such assistance in Mexico's war against drug cartels doesn't require restrictions on the gun rights of law-abiding Americans.

"It should be noted that any effort to restrict gun ownership in the U.S. will not stop Mexican cartels from acquiring guns and ammunition from other countries," the Arizona Republican and former presidential candidate told thousands of people in Phoenix.

INVESTORS BILKED OUT OF $44.3 MILLION

LOS ANGELES — A Beverly Hills hedge fund manager was arrested yesterday on a charge he bilked investors out of $44.3 million, including $5 million he lost playing poker, the U.S. attorney's office said.

Bradley L. Ruderman, 46, surrendered to FBI agents after being named in a wire fraud complaint. He was later released on $500,000 bond.

The government alleges he spent at least $8.7 million of investor money on personal expenses including a summer rental of a Malibu beach home and two Porsches. He admitted in an FBI interview that he lost $5.2 million of investor money in poker games held in a Beverly Hills luxury hotel suite, the U.S. attorney's office said in a statement.

PIRATE ATTACKS CALLED OPPORTUNISTIC

LONDON — Pirate attacks off the Somali coast appear to be mainly opportunistic and there is no indication that vessels are targeted with the help of intelligence from international contacts, a maritime watchdog said yesterday.

The International Maritime Bureau said there was no evidence to support media reports that individuals with access to information about shipping routes and cargoes may be helping pirates to locate the most vulnerable ships, and ones most likely to yield large ransoms.

Pirate raids on vessels off the Horn of Africa have surged this year, confounding authorities who have been hard-pressed to curb the assaults despite the deployment of an international task force of military craft.

CAMERAS INSTALLED ATOP GIANT TORTOISES

QUITO, Ecuador — Scientists in the Galapagos Islands have installed cameras on the shells of giant tortoises in a study that could shed light on how they live, mate and migrate.

Galapagos National Park official Washington Tapia says the research project includes two tortoises in captivity and a third in the wild.

The National Geographic Society, the Charles Darwin Foundation and Germany's Max Planck Institute are participating.

The endangered giant Galapagos tortoise is the world's largest living tortoise.