I know he did, and he's always been somewhat political but early on, he wasn't, I'd say he was more limited in his themes and vision up until maybe Born In The USA meaning the oppressive forces were maybe a parent or an employer, he matured and started to see how things are much bigger than that. He's not perfect though, he made the single Born In The USA and played the patriot angle up as well as said that it wasn't a patriotic song, he played both sides. And as he's gotten older, he's gotten more and more outspoken in interviews and more articulate. I'm aware he's always been for the marginalized americans but he expanded that to include marginalized latinos too, the irony to me is, those two groups have been at each other's throats forever.
As for my own feelings, he's just a person and as his fanzine creator, Charles Cross, told me "he's not what you think he is" and went on to explain that by saying, and I paraphrase "people think that bruce is the one exception to rockstars, that he doesn't do things for money and that's not true, the last album was put out to make money" I think it was either one of Bruce's greatest hits albums with the teaser of one or two new songs to make fans buy one more album, or it was the "Tracks" set which was packaged in different versions to make idiot fans spead the maximum amount. He's just a man. To his credit he admits it, "the public Bruce Springsteen doesn't exist".