Biden says 'giant red wave' did not happen as US counts votes

President Joe Biden, buoyed by midterm elections in which his fellow Democrats fared better than expected, has said that the election was good for democracy but the results showed that Americans remained frustrated.

"While the press and the pundits were predicting a giant red wave it didn't happen," said the president on Wednesday, who had framed the race as a clash between defenders of democracy and the "extremist" camp of former president Donald Trump.

"Our democracy has been tested in recent years but with their votes, the American people have spoken and proven once again that democracy is who we are," Biden told reporters.

Biden said that he expects to decide early next year whether he will seek re-election for another four-year term.

Biden repeated that he intends to run for office again but that it was a family decision and that he would seek their consultation over the holidays.

"I am a great respecter of fate," Biden said.

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READ MORE: US Republicans closer to House win; Senate seats up for grabs

'Endless political warfare'

Biden said he would veto efforts to pass a national ban on abortion and opposed tax cuts for the wealthy, two policy proposals Republicans may pursue.

He said when he returns from a trip to Asia he would invite Democratic and Republican leaders to the White House to discuss priorities going forward.

Biden appealed for political unity after elections in which his party looked set to narrowly lose control of the House of Representatives, calling for an end to "endless political warfare."

"I'm prepared to work with my Republican colleagues," he said. "The future of America's too promising to be trapped in an endless political warfare."

READ MORE: 'Politicians are playing games': Americans share what drew them to polls

Republicans closing in on 218 House seats

Meanwhile, the Senate control hung in the balance while Republicans edged closer to securing a majority in the House of Representatives.

The Senate contests in Nevada and Arizona, where Democratic incumbents were seeking to hold off Republican challengers, were as yet undecided, with thousands of uncounted ballots that could take days to tally.

If the parties split those races, the Senate's fate would come down to a Georgia runoff election for the second time in two years, after Edison Research projected neither Democratic incumbent Raphael Warnock nor Republican Herschel Walker would reach the 50 percent necessary to avoid a Dec. 6 one-on-one rematch.

Republicans were closing in on the 218 seats needed to wrest control of the House from Democrats, with 210 now in their column, Edison Research projected. But 21 of the 53 most competitive races, based on a Reuters analysis of the leading nonpartisan forecasters, were still pending as of Wednesday evening, raising the prospect that the final outcome may not be known for some time.

Even a slim House majority would let Republicans hem in Democratic President Biden during his next two years in office, blocking legislation and launching potentially politically damaging investigations.