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For Katie Telford and Gerald Butts, the path to the Prime Minister’s Office began not at Queen’s Park, where they cut their political teeth, but in Athens.

The duo met at a debating competition in the Greek capital in the 1990s. They went on to forge a remarkable professional partnership — first at the Ontario legislature, then in the federal opposition leader’s office.

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Butts, Justin Trudeau’s principal adviser, and Telford, the party’s national campaign director and chair, were the architects of Trudeau’s come-from-behind victory. He singled them out in his victory speech Monday night. The next day Telford, 38, and Butts, 44, looked on as Trudeau announced he and his cabinet will take power on Nov. 4.

“They’ve written themselves into the history of this party and this country based on where they took the party from a distant and failing third to a near-perfect winning campaign,” said Bob Lopinski, a principal at Counsel Public Affairs and the man who ran the Ontario Liberals’ successful 2014 war room.