Meet the Players

is a Managing Director at Goldman Sachs. Jon first attended the All-in for a Cure Poker Tournament in 2013 along with fellow committee member Peter Vermette. Jon has been supporting the Poker Benefit Committee since 2014 and joined the Committee in 2023. Jon lives in NYC with his wife Emily and their three kids.

is the very proud father of EJ. He is the former Chairman of the NY State Housing Finance Agency and the State of NY Mortgage Agency and currently serves as Vice Chairman of Westbeth Artists Housing in the west village. Judd is the founder and former President of CDT, the country’s only affordable housing REIT. He is an accomplished no-limit cash and tournament player. In 2018 he played in the WSOP Seniors Tournament with 5,388 players and finished 55th (top 1.1%) and won $9,239! Last June he cashed in the Super Seniors WSOP tournament, two months shy of his 80th birthday! He is currently ranked 53,002nd on the United States All Time Money List.

is an Executive Producer at ABC NEWS responsible for GMA3: What You Need to Know and specials on ABC News Live and is proud to be a founding member of the MS Hope for a Cure Board of Directors. She met EJ while the two were cheering on their respective football teams at their favorite sports bar. She’s “all-in” to finding a cure for MS, which she believes, will happen in their lifetime.

feel so lucky to be involved with MS Hope for a Cure. Stacy sits on the MS Hope for a Cure Board of Directors and is also the Board President of the Jewish Community Project Downtown. Her father suffers from the primary progressive form of MS. Jonathan is the Global Head of Structured Finance at Blackstone, They live with their two boys and two dogs in Manhattan. The Pollack family knows that a cure for MS will be found with the money raised from events like this!

is a senior partner at Allen & Overy LLP, where he co-heads the International Trade and Regulatory Law Group and heads the International Environmental Law Group. His practice focuses on a range of US and international regulatory issues, including economic sanctions, trade & national security (including dealings with the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS)), anti-corruption compliance, environment law & ESG, climate change, human rights, and supply chain and other business risk,. He is a Lecturer-in- Law at Columbia Law School, and serves or has served on numerous NGO boards and bar committees. Currently, he is Chair of the Advisory Council for the Institute at Brown (University) for Environment and Society, and President of the Board of Trustees for the Human Needs Food Pantry, Inc.

is the lucky guy married to co-chair Eden Lopez-Robles. Their love of poker is one of the things that brought them together and Anthony actually asked Eden to marry him at the poker table. He planned an elaborate proposal at a poker room in Atlantic City and when the dealer turned over the flop, turn and river, it was a Straight Flush (hearts) with the words Eden - Will - You - Marry - Me printed on the cards. When Anthony is not sweeping Eden off her feet he is helping clients find their dream homes as one of the founding partners of the Scott-Robles Team at Douglas Elliman. They are ranked among the top 250 real estate teams in the country. Anthony and Eden live in Manhattan with their three children, Briana, Maxwell and Dylan.

met EJ playing poker in NYC home games over 10 years ago. She was immediately inspired by EJ’s story of perseverance, hope, love for life and her ability to turn her MS struggles into a positive powerful movement. May is a two time WSOP Women finalist. She quit finance several years ago looking for something that would fulfill both her nerdy and artistic nature. When the pandemic hit, she sprung into action, dedicating her work to her community and founded Murals for Good, a nonprofit art organization made up of dedicated New Yorkers who believe the power of art can heal their fractured city. Today, they have created a platform for social and environmental justice activism. They are a winner of the NYS DRI grant and are currently planning the world’s first-ever social and environmentally sustainable Murals for Good festival in NYC Chinatown. Imagine murals that purify the air we breath in NYC by absorbong CO2! To learn more visit www.muralsforgood.org or talk to May (May@muralsforgood.org) in person on May 4th.

Michael Stepniewski first attended the tournament as a guest in 2016, and after seven years, has finally learned how to resist the urge to laugh when he’s bluffing at the poker table. As a member of the benefit committee, he has focused his efforts on bringing a new wave of donors and contributors to the tournament each year. Mike is a born and bred New Yorker and lives in Manhattan’s West Village. When he’s not facing elimination from poker tournaments at lightning speed, he works in the NYC capital markets group at Walker & Dunlop.

met EJ through his work as a Board Member of the NYC Chapter of the National Multiple Sclerosis Society which he joined in hopes of helping to find a cure for his dad, Greg, and everyone else living with the disease. He attended the tournament for the first time in 2013 and has since joined the committee and made this an annual event with his friends and colleagues. Peter lives with his wife and their three children in Westchester.

joined their sister Eden, MS hope board Chair, and her husband Anthony, on the 2023 Poker Benefit Committee this year to honor their parents, Lois and Harold, and celebrate all that they accomplished during their over 35-year fight against MS. Their parents touched the lives of so many people living with MS and they are looking forward to sharing stories of the two at the Benefit.