LaPointe earned a Bachelor of Arts in sociology from Grinnell College and a Master's in Social Work from the University of Illinois at Chicago. She was the program manager of Adult Redeploy Illinois at the Illinois Criminal Justice Information Authority, an agency that works with county officials on court-based alternatives to incarceration. She has cited her frustration with the impact of the Illinois Budget Impasse on the agency as one of her motivations to enter politics. She also worked as project manager of justice reform at Business and Professional People for the Public Interest. Her early engagement in electoral politics included organizing for congressman Jesús "Chuy" García. She served as vice president of the 45th Ward Independent Democrats organization, and was a delegate to the Illinois Women’s Institute for Leadership in 2018. From 2014 to 2018, she served vice president of the board of Hands to Help Ministries, a non-profit organization focused on addressing homelessness. She currently serves on the Dean’s Advisory Council on Diversity, Equity and Social Inclusion at the Jane Addams College of Social Work.
On July 24, 2019, LaPointe was appointed to serve as representative for the 19th district in the Illinois House for the remainder of outgoing representative Robert Martwick's term. Martwick had in turn been appointed as state senator for the 10th district to replace John Mulroe. Vacancies in the Illinois state legislature are filled by the party of the outgoing officeholder, and the Cook County Democratic Party delegates this decision to ward and township committeepeople who receive weighted votes based on previous election results. John Arena, committeeman for the 45th ward and former alderman for the ward, held 47 percent of the weighted vote, while Martwick held 33 percent of the vote as committeeman for the 38th ward. Both Arena and Martwick supported LaPointe in the appointment vote. Timothy Heneghan, the 41st ward committeeman who had unsuccessfully sought appointment to the senate vacancy that Martwick filled, accused the process of being a "back room deal." LaPointe is currently running for a full two-year term in the 2020 Illinois elections. In the Democratic primary election for the seat, she faces Chicago police officer Joe Duplechin and former WGN radio personality Patti Vasquez. She has been endorsed by the Chicago Tribune, the Chicago Sun-Times, Chicago mayor Lori Lightfoot, U.S. Senator Dick Durbin, U.S. Representative Mike Quigley, former state senator Daniel Biss, and a number of labor unions. In March 2020, LaPointe circulated campaign mailings alleging that her two opponents were anti-women's rights by pointing to past electoral support of particular donors. Duplechin and Vasquez criticized the mailer, and NBC Chicago found that LaPointe had received similar donations from some of the very same donors. LaPointe won the primary election on March 17, 2020 with 41.3% of the vote, and will face Jeff Muehlfelder in the general election on November 3, 2020.
Tenure
In February 2020, LaPointe introduced legislation that would allow first responders to claim worker's compensation benefits to cover post-traumatic stress disorder. That same month, she sponsored legislation that would require the Department of Veterans' Affairs to create a veterans assistance hotline. She has also co-sponsored legislation including the Clean Energy Jobs Act, a bill that would allow eligible students to vote during school hours on election day, and a bill that would create a state-wide Domestic Violence Task Force.
