Except Gore wasn’t.
If Florida had done a partial recount that Gore demanded (only a few heavily Democrat counties), he would have lost.
In a full recount, he would have “won” only under some very liberal recounting standards, which were made without any opportunity to challenge the standard or individual ballots. It was so close, there is no way to predict the outcome.
The national popular vote was only 0.51% in favor of Mr. Gore (half a percent). It did not include many outstanding mail in ballots (that would not have affected the electoral votes) across the nation. It did not include allegations of possible vote fraud (that would not have affected the electoral votes).
If we went to a popular vote victory, we would still be recounting ballots nationwide in the 2000 vote.