Democratic senators refused to call for Democratic Sen. Al Franken to step down Thursday, instead requesting an investigation from the ethics committee into a report from a female news anchor that the Minnesota senator harassed and groped her.

Some Democratic senators said that they believed the allegation from Leeann Tweeden that Franken kissed and groped her without her consent in 2006 when the two were on a USO tour. Franken responded that he doesn’t remember the incident in which Tweeden said he forcibly kissed her and that a photograph of him groping her while she was asleep was meant as a joke but in poor taste.