Her right-hand man: ABC's hit freshman drama Commander in Chief outs a major character and gives him HIV. The actor's response? Bring it on.

When Anthony Azizi heard that the writers on ABC's hit White House drama Commander in Chief were considering making his character, Vince Taylor--personal aide to President Mackenzie Allen (Geena Davis)--both HIV-positive and gay, he felt responsible for making sure that Vince continued to be seen as sympathetic by viewers in Middle America, especially since the character is of Palestinian descent.

"It's not an edgy feature film or HBO--it's network television," says Azizi, who was born in Iran. "[People with] HIV, the gay community, the Arab community right now have enough pressure as it is to just get their voices heard."

Earlier this year, when a scene came up in which President Allen asked Vince to bring her young daughter up to bed from the Oval Office, Azizi says he requested that Vince affectionately lift the girl over his shoulder and carry her out. "It was a very small moment," he explains, "but I did that because I want to give this character humanity, to show [viewers in hindsight] that even though Vince has HIV it doesn't mean that he can't work with kids. People shouldn't fear it."

On the show Vince discloses that he is gay and HIV-positive under pressure from the president's political enemies on Capitol Hill--a mini scandal worsened because Vince, mostly due to his archconservative cultural background, has hidden the truth from everyone at the White House, including his boss. "[President Allen] just feels that by his lying he put her in an awkward position," explains Davis, who, as a co-executive producer on the show, says she's thrilled with the story line. "Either she was dumb because she didn't know [that Vince was gay and HIV-positive], or she was helping him hide something, which is unethical as well." (She does eventually forgive him.)

It all fits in with Chief's exploration of the particular tribulations facing a political independent who also happens to be the first female president of the United States. Executive producer Dee Johnson notes that Vince's recent story line asks the question "How does somebody like President Allen, who has her heart in the right place, deal with a situation that is potentially damaging politically when it involves somebody she cares about?"

Johnson, Davis, and Azizi all say they are acutely aware of the issues involved in loading so many burdens onto a character with such a sensitive position in the show's fictional White House. "I think there have been people who have worked in the White House that have been HIV-positive," says Johnson, citing Chief's many White House-alum consultants, "but not anybody that we know of this close to the president."

Trickier still is how much the disease should figure in the drama. "It's a real dual-edged sword," says Davis. "You want people not to look at people who are living this way [and come away feeling] that they can't be as productive as anybody else, but on the other hand you don't want to make it sound like it's just like having a cold or something."

Vince couldn't ask for a better advocate than Azizi, 36, who has been affected by HIV and AIDS a great deal since he started out as an actor in Philadelphia and New York City. He watched a good friend waste away from AIDS in the early 1990s, and Azizi's wife, who is half Zimbabwean, has lost several friends and family members to the disease.

"It's just devastating. And the courage ..." Azizi pauses and takes a deep breath. "I'm just getting emotional, I'm sorry. The courage that people need, facing the specter of what they have to live with, and to do it with such strength and dignity and grace--I just hope in my heart that my character will do something to help people [with HIV], bring awareness, and make some changes."

Vary also writes for Entertainment Weekly.