Even before he was declared the winner of the 2020 election, many Americans suspected that President Joe Biden was operating with a diminished physical and mental health capacity compared to just four years earlier when he'd served as vice president.

Now, as his single presidential term draws near an end, a damning report has seemingly confirmed what many already believed -- the White House went to great lengths to hide Biden's declining health and cognition from everybody else, according to the Daily Mail.

That includes not just the general public, the media, and his Republican critics, but also many of Biden's own Cabinet officials and fellow Democrats in Congress, much to their increasing consternation and dismay.

White House protected a "diminished" Biden

In a bombshell report based on dozens of interviews with current and former advisors, officials, and elected lawmakers, The Wall Street Journal detailed how the White House "functioned" over the past four years with an increasingly "diminished" President Biden in charge.

Beginning during his 2020 campaign and increasing in intensity throughout his tenure in office, concerted efforts were made by Biden's closest and most loyal advisors to disguise or downplay the full extent of his cognitive decline and the worsening impact of his advanced age.

Those efforts included keeping in-person meetings and phone calls brief, focused, and infrequent, including with many of his own Cabinet officials and Democratic congressional leaders.

It also involved deliberately gaslighting political allies and foes alike about the reality of Biden's inability to perform the job of the presidency in the same manner as his predecessors.

None of this is acceptable

The Wall Street Journal report exposed how President Biden's inner circle worked to keep his interactions with others limited, how his top aides would fill in to perform duties typically done by the president, and how his press aides attempted to quash negative stories about him.

It also revealed how a small group of aides were tasked with "hand holding" the elderly president and accompanying him everywhere to provide him with basic information about where to stand or what to do that would otherwise be common sense for most anybody else.

The report further detailed how Biden's schedule would often be altered to fit within his "good days and bad days," how congressional leaders and Cabinet officials would often have to communicate with the president indirectly through his handlers, and how he was typically insulated from others and shielded from bad news by those same close aides.

Those efforts were seemingly going well enough until late June of this year, when Biden's diminished state became glaringly evident for the whole world to see following his disastrous debate performance against his rival predecessor, President-elect Donald Trump, who was handily defeating Biden in the polls at that time, even if Biden was kept unaware of that reality by his protective inner circle.

Biden ultimately withdrew from his failing re-election bid and was replaced by Vice President Kamala Harris, who would go on to lose to Trump in decisive fashion to Trump, at least in part due to her inability to distance herself from Biden and the exposure of her fraudulent claims that he was perfectly fine and capable.

Report confirms what many have long suspected

To be sure, while the details of the Journal's damning report may prove shocking to those who bought the White House and media lies about President Biden's health status, it is largely just confirmation to the millions of Americans who suspected the elderly president was diminished since he first entered office.

That is at least partially reflected by Biden's dismal approval ratings, which began to decline almost immediately after he began his term, entered negative territory during the deadly withdrawal from Afghanistan, never recovered higher than 44% over the ensuing years, and is now below 40% as everyone awaits the anticipated end of his lame-duck presidency.