Editor’s Note: Brian Holt is the Managing Editor of WEHOonline, West Hollywood’s most widely read hyperlocal news outlet. He was appointed in November 2025 by WEHOonline owner and co-founder Larry Block, who is expected to run for West Hollywood City Council in November 2026. WEHOonline has stated that Block will have no editorial role during any candidacy.
Brian Holt, will you investigate what your publication did in September 2024?
That’s a real question. Not rhetorical. Not a setup. WEHOonline’s new Managing Editor has positioned himself as the editorial firewall between Larry Block’s ownership and WEHOonline’s newsroom. Block is signaling another run for West Hollywood City Council. Holt is supposed to be the reason we trust the coverage.
Will you look at whether your publication coordinated with John Erickson before Zekiah Wright was arrested? Will you examine how WEHOonline obtained advance knowledge of law enforcement action against a rival candidate? Will you explain to your readers how a news outlet owned by a candidate ran what amounted to opposition research against that candidate’s competition?
So here’s the test: Will Brian Holt look into what happened the last time Larry Block ran for office and WEHOonline covered the race?
Because what happened is on the record.
On September 5, 2024, the West Hollywood Chamber PAC endorsed Zekiah Wright and George Nickle for City Council. Larry Block and John Erickson were both shut out.
On September 10, Block published an op-ed on WEHOonline titled “The Chamber Sold Me Out,” in which he confirmed he had been trying to politically align with Erickson.
On September 11, Erickson formally submitted a complaint against Wright related to an LLC filing irregularity — a matter he had reportedly known about since “mid-spring.”
On September 12, WEHOonline published a story framing the matter as a felony arrest. The site had known about the impending arrest days before it happened. That leak did not come from the Sheriff’s Department.
On September 13, WEHOonline published a follow-up tying Wright’s legal trouble to a personal breakup.
Wright’s campaign was effectively destroyed. Erickson and Danny Hang won the two seats. Block finished third.
The timeline speaks for itself. A candidate who owned the publication. An incumbent who filed a complaint months after learning of the issue, timed to the week his rival got an endorsement. A news outlet that had advance knowledge of law enforcement action against a competitor in the race its owner was running in. And wall-to-wall coverage designed to end a candidacy.
This is not speculation. These are dates, bylines, and public filings.
In March 2026, WEHOonline published a story about Block eyeing the 2026 race. An editor’s note at the top stated that Block would have “no editorial role at WEHOonline” for the duration of any candidacy, and that the decision was made to prevent even “the appearance of a conflict of interest.”
Holt was brought on as Managing Editor in November 2025. He’s a 25-year West Hollywood resident and a veteran media producer with real credentials. His early coverage has been substantive. The K Line funding gap story was strong local journalism. Nobody disputes his qualifications.
But qualifications are not the issue. The issue is the platform he’s standing on.
Larry Block purchased WEHOville (now WEHOonline) in April 2021 through Boystown Media Inc. He is the owner. He controls the business. He has used the publication to run favorable coverage of his own campaigns and unfavorable coverage of his opponents across multiple election cycles. In 2024, an anonymous complaint to the City Attorney accused Block of posting fraudulent comments on WEHOonline under assumed names to mislead voters. Rival outlets have called the site a vehicle for Block’s political ambitions since at least 2024.
None of this is new. What’s new is that someone credible is now in the editor’s chair and claiming independence.
Three City Council seats are on the ballot this year. John Heilman and Lauren Meister are termed out. Chelsea Byers is the only incumbent who can run again. John Erickson is running for State Senate, which could open a fourth vacancy. The field is already crowded with declared and exploring candidates.
This is the most consequential West Hollywood election in a generation. And the city’s most widely read local news outlet is owned by one of the candidates.
An editorial firewall works when the wall is built from the outside — by institutional structure, legal separation, or independent governance. It doesn’t work when the owner builds it, the owner defines it, and the owner can quietly take it down.
Brian Holt didn’t build WEHOonline. He didn’t buy it. He doesn’t own it. He was hired by the man who did all three, and who is now asking voters to trust a wall he constructed around himself.
So we return to where we started.
Brian Holt, will you investigate what WEHOonline did in September 2024?
Will you look at whether your publication coordinated with John Erickson before the Wright arrest? Will you examine how WEHOonline obtained advance knowledge of law enforcement action against a rival candidate? Will you explain to your readers how a news outlet owned by a candidate ran what amounted to opposition research against that candidate’s competition?
And if you find what the public record already suggests, will you tell us?
Because that’s what editorial independence means. Not a note at the top of an article. Not a promise from the owner. It means doing the story your boss doesn’t want you to do.
The 2026 race has already started. West Hollywood deserves to know whether WEHOonline is a newspaper or a campaign office.
