Washington Intern Experience
July 30 -- On any given summer day, 10,000 interns are busy at work on Capitol Hill. They answer phones, sort mail, and give tours for members of Congress and various federal officials.
But there is a lot more to the intern experience than many of them anticipated.
Rubbing Powerful Elbows
When the sun goes down, the interns — mostly college kids — learn about another part of the Washington scene. Just a few blocks away from the apartment where Chandra Levy had been living when she disappeared May 1, interns crowd into Washington's many clubs and bars.
It is one of the arenas in Washington where the young mix with the powerful, and each has to figure out how to deal with the other — without set rules or training. For many female interns, it is also the first time they attract the attention of older men.
"Coming to Washington, D.C., has been quite a culture shock for me, because I'm from a rural town," one intern told ABCNEWS' 20/20.
In many cases, ambitious young people are swept away by the experience. "There's something that affects 20-year-old idealistic women on their way to Washington," says syndicated columnist Michelle Malkin, who was once a Capitol Hill intern herself. "It's a romantic flu."
Rep. Pete Sessions, R-Texas, who runs one of the biggest, best-organized intern programs on Capitol Hill, says, "It would be foolish to assume that my college students go home and tuck themselves into bed every night."
He cautions his interns — particularly the female ones — to be careful. "This is a difficult place to test the ropes," he says, "and sometimes bad things happen."
Looking for Love in All the Wrong Places
Sessions says interns should be off-limits to members of Congress and their staff, but 20/20 spoke to several interns who said they were frequently hit on by older staffers. "It's a meat market here," says Mary, a 21-year-old intern who asked that her last name not be used.
"I'm surprised at how many older men will hit on younger women," says Mary, a college student from Michigan. "I see guys come in and hit on women who are 20, who are 45 or 50 years old."
