Stella Linardi is a structural policy analyst for the UCLA Labor Center and a labor organizer under the Asian Pacific American Labor Alliance, AFL-CIO. A native of Manado, Indonesia and Jakarta, Indonesia, Stella migrated to the United States as an asylum-seeker in hopes for better socioeconomic, and educational opportunities in the United States. After receiving a removal order in 2007 in Pennsylvania, her and her family sought sanctuary in Los Angeles, CA. She grew up in the Bellflower, Compton, Downey region and attended primary and secondary school under ABCUSD. As a high schooler, she helped to ignite the Sanctuary Movement under Labor Secretary nominee Julie Su, worked 30 hours/week as a customer service worker, and interned for the Long Beach Dept. of Industrial Relations Wage Division.

While attending Cornell University, Ms. Linardi brought her knowledge, wisdom, and lived experience as a marginalized person to affect positive systemic change in CA and Congress, as a Senate Casework Intern for former CA Senator Kamala Harris. During her time at Cornell University, Stella became the Vice President of Cornell DREAM Team, where she organized and led a rally for Undocu-Joy and institutional inclusion/support. She became the student President of the Roosevelt Network at Cornell, training student policy analysts in the field of public interest, and promoted trauma-informed care as the Director of Student and Campus Life under the Cornell Office of the Student Advocate. She was also a legal intern for the Cornell Criminal Justice and Employment Initiative, a content writer for the Cornell ILR Communications Dept., and a Research Fellow for the Workers’ Institute at Cornell University. There, she is most proud to have been involved with the development of the MRTA (preceding Governor Hochul’s appointment); to have been able to build political coalitions with the Working Families’ Party, NYCOSH, and real nail salon workers; and champion for international civil rights for gig workers in the digital economy.

Having been from the bottom income percentile of the Cornell student body, Stella nonetheless graduated from Cornell University with a Bachelor’s of Science in Industrial and Labor Relations (Labor Studies), a minor in Inequality Studies, and was awarded the Irving M. Ives Student Award—given to the graduating senior who best demonstrates the qualities of good faith, integrity, responsibility, cooperativeness and good will.

She is an incoming UCLA Law student (Class of 2026). She is ethnically Chinese, Japanese, and Indonesian.